A Storm of Chaos
by hahatimeforponies
Summary: Rainbow Dash is helping Twilight Sparkle with some testing outside Ponyville, when an old friend makes an unexpected visit, thrusting Dash into bewildering circumstances and with just her wings and her wits to rely on.
1. Au Contraire, Mes Petits Poneys

A/N, specifically to people who have read my other stories: This story is set in the same _multiverse_ as Rainbow Leap, but not the same _universe_. If you've read Rainbow Leap, you'll know what the distinction is, but if you haven't, disregard this sentence, no harm done. To those of you waiting on a sequel to Harmony's Wrath, I have a bunch of stuff planned, but I feel it needs to gestate some more, and this will keep me sharp while that happens.

* * *

><p>"Alright Rainbow, all set to go."<p>

"_Nnngh! Too tight! Too tight!_"

"Eep!" Twilight Sparkle loosened a strap around Rainbow Dash's stomach, letting her breathe more easily. "Sorry. It's not like I had Rarity's help with this."

"I can tell..." Dash raised an eyebrow and examined herself. She was wearing an experimental flight suit Twilight had built. It wasn't like one the Wonderbolts' flight suits; no, there was much more in this than brightly coloured spandex. The dull grey material was felt like rough canvas, and had all sorts of mechanical bells and whistles attached to it with some mysterious, arcane function. Twilight said something about them making her move faster, but she didn't quite see how that was supp_woah._ She went to step forward, and her body jerked forward significantly more than she intended it to. It was like there had been this invisible friction from the air that she was now freed from; it was an odd feeling. Her limbs moved through the air alarmingly quickly when she moved them, and when she tried to jump, she leaped twice as high as she normally would under the circumstances, and fell twice as hard. _Why did I agree to this again?_

"Having fun?" Twilight chuckled. Dash bounced around the library like a little filly, testing out how the apparatus affected her movement.

"This is... _weird..._"

"So it's..." _Crash._ Rainbow Dash collided with a shelf and liberated that wall of its books. "... working..."

"Yep!" She popped her head out from the pile of books, unfazed.

"Alright, there's just one last thing to complete the set..." Twilight floated a pair of goggles over to Rainbow, and snapped them around her head for her.

"_Ow!_" Dash yelped, pushing them up to her forehead. "Watch it!"

"Were you going to put those on yourself?" Twilight chuckled, and headed out. Dash grumbled and followed, still getting used to her strange, altered movement physics.

* * *

><p>Outside, the sun was shining brightly on Ponyville. Plenty of ponies were out on this fine spring morning, so any hopes the two had of making it out of town quietly were promptly dashed. Twilight had hoped to make it out to one of the meadows just beyond the river for the 'test' - whatever that meant - and Rainbow wasn't eager to be seen looking like <em>this <em>for very long, so neither of them were particularly pleased when they picked out Pinkie Pie bouncing through the crowd towards them.

"Hey guys! Whatcha doi_oooooh,_ what's this?" She immediately shoved her head underneath Rainbow's front legs to inspect the main box of flashy lights and doodads hanging off her. Dash jumped into the air to hover, nearly rocketing away into the sky by accident.

"Nothing! It's nothing!" She clasped her hooves underneath her chest. Pinkie pouted.

"It's not my birthday, is it?"

"Actually, Pinkie," Twilight butted in. "We were on our way to do some flight tests. Ordinary, boring stuff. You probably wouldn't be interested."

"Aww, but when Dashie flies it always looks _so cool!_ Zip, zow, _zoom_, _peeyooow!_" Pinkie waved a front hoof in front of her face, back, forth, then back again, and then around, knocking herself over in the process.

"Alright, you can watch..." Twilight groaned. "Just... try not to tell anyone, okay?"

"_Oooo_kie dokie lokie!" She zipped her mouth shut, and fell in line behind them.

* * *

><p>They had tried to pick a quiet route around the back alleys, away from prying public eyes. Cross the road outside the library, duck in between Quills 'n' Sofas and the Hardware Store, and then just follow the back roads out of town behind Sugarcube Corner and the Carousel Boutique. Unfortunately, timing was against them. As they were sneaking past the back door of the Carousel Boutique, it burst open, and Rarity trotted out, hovering a bag of garbage in front of her. They hoped to sneak past unnoticed, but as soon as it was in the can, they could hide no longer. The first thing Rarity noticed was entirely predictable.<p>

"Rainbow Dash, what in the wide world of Equestria are you _wearing?_" She zipped over and scrutinised the suit intently, looking more disgusted the more she saw. Dash grumbled. "I know you're not usually one for fashion, but this just takes the cake!"

"Actually, Rarity, I _built_ that. Emphasis on _built_." Twilight interrupted. "This isn't a fashion accessory, it's a flight suit. And we're testing it. Okay?"

"There's no need to snap, Twilight..." Rarity backed up a little. "Mind if I... tag along? Just out of curiosity? Maybe I could beautify that old rag for you when you're done with it."

"I guess..." Rainbow Dash sighed. She was gradually becoming more confident in her movement with the suit, and was just about managing to hover around on her back without spiralling out of control.

"Fine..." Twilight groaned, and they carried on.

* * *

><p>"Ah still don't get where yer comin' from, Fluttershy," They heard as they approached the crest of the hill. They'd recognise that voice anywhere.<p>

"It's pretty simple really, if the animals can't get in to graze, wild grasses and weeds start outgrowing the crops you want to grow, and..."

"Oh, alright, _everypony_ can come watch us." Twilight smacked her forehead with a hoof when she reached the top of the hill, to see Fluttershy and Applejack a few lengths away discussing something about farming and fencing off plots. They looked up when they heard them coming, a little confused, but when they saw Rainbow Dash's unusual attire, they got the general idea. "Okay Rainbow, can you do a few test loops first?"

"Done!" Dash grinned, finally getting a chance to stretch her wings. She went in for a tight vertical loop of about five yards, but with her increased speed, she ended up forming a much wider circle, twenty yards across. Twilight could tell from the look on her face that it was working.

"Hah. Now that we know everything's working on the technical end, start warming up, I want you to give this everything you've g-"

_Fswsh._

"-ot...?" A strange noise and a bright flash of light behind the group caught their attention. Twilight wheeled around on her front hooves, and promptly fell over in fright. One by one, all the others turned around, and their jaws hung open in sheer disbelief. "D... d-d-d..."

"Delighted to see me? Wonderful!"

"_Discord!_" All six exclaimed together.

"Nice to see your memories are all in working order." The draconequus smirked, idly sprawling on the trunk of a tree, strung sideways between two stiff hammocks sticking out of the ground.

"It's impossible!" The colour drained from Twilight's face.

"Oh, did you _really_ think being turned into stone was enough to stop a lord of chaos?" Discord chuckled. "I can alter the very fabric of reality at the click..." _Click._ In a flash of light, Fluttershy disappeared, and in her place was a small, pale yellow bird with a soft pink crest. "... of my fingers, and you thought a few pieces of jewellery could seal me away?" He was steadily cracking up over the course of his sentence, and before very long he was rolling on the ground laughing.

"_What_ did you to do Fluttershy?" Rarity barked, visibly distraught.

"Oh, I think a better question might be..." _Click._ With another flash, Rarity was replaced with a little white cat, with purple tipped ears. It blinked, looked around in confusion for a moment, before lunging after Fluttershy. "... what did I to you?" he leered.

"This ain't funny, Discord!" Applejack snarled.

"Oh, Applejack, you are just dull as a rock today!" _Click._ Applejack froze in place, and the colour of her coat faded to grey. Within a second, she had turned to stone. "Geddit? Rock? _Ha!_" He paused, as if waiting for a response. When met with silence, he pouted. He summoned a microphone from nowhere and tapped a claw on it. "Hello? Is this thing on?" Eventually, Pinkie Pie broke down and sniggered at the pun. Twilight kicked her flank. "Ah, the element of laughter, my old favourite..." He swirled around Pinkie in mid-air, giving her the gentlest of tickles under her chin. Her snickering quickly gave way to hearty giggles, and then a full-on belly laugh. Twilight and Rainbow Dash started to back away. "I always saw a little something in you... a little promise..." A twinkling sound emanated from Pinkie. Slowly, colour and saturation began to drain from her body, her bright cerise mane and pale pink coat dulling to muted grey colours. As the colour faded, her laughter shifted from innocent, joyous giggling to devious, sinister cackling. Once complete, she eased up, and her mane fell down over her face, obscuring half of her malicious grin. "... I think we'll enjoy working together." She turned to face Twilight and Dash, who were by now fleeing at full tilt.

"Gotta think of a plan, gotta think of a plan..." Twilight was sprinting as fast as she could in the general direction of Ponyville, while Dash was just lightly jogging to stay with her.

_Fswsh._ Discord reappeared in front of them. The skidded to a halt.

"Oh, aren't you going to bring your friend with you?" He pouted. Behind them, Pinkie Pie was charging after them. Rainbow Dash took to the air, and Pinkie lunged at Twilight. Twilight winked out, reappearing about twenty lengths away on the next hill. Discord only had to snap his fingers, and Pinkie was right on top of her again.

"We're gonna have _so much fun!_" Pinkie grinned, pinning Twilight to the ground and gnashing her teeth at her.

"Rainbow Dash, _run!_ Get out of here as..." Pinkie's jaws narrowly missed her face. "... as fast as you can!" Twilight threw Pinkie off with a psychic shove and bolted in another direction. Dash didn't need to be told twice. She immediately started towards the sky, passing the cloud layer almost instantly. Behind her, the clouds slammed together in a thick, grey wall. She heard a _crunch_ when they closed, like two walls of stone colliding. She gulped, pulled the goggles down over her eyes, and carried on up.

With the extra acceleration the flight suit afforded her, she was climbing to the thin air much quicker than she had anticipated. She even passed the sound barrier on her way _up_ - though rather than the almighty _boom_ she expected, all she heard of it was a little _pop_. She was accelerating too quickly to stay in the vicinity of the Sonic Rainboom for very long. She was a little disappointed at how anticlimactically it passed; however, there were more important things to worry about right now. She levelled off at the highest point at which she could keep breathing, and started to descend again at a shallow angle. Her speed picked up even more here, and as she neared the ground, things around her started to look funny - her peripheral vision started to go dark, while the point directly ahead of her was becoming brighter. _See you on the other side,_ a voice said in her head. She instantly recognised it as Discord's. She didn't want to know how he was in her head, or what he was doing there. _The more distance between me and him, the better_, she thought. She levelled out fully when nearing the ground, and continued horizontally.

Then, everything whited out.

Funny things happen when you break the light barrier.


	2. Rainbow October

Dash lurched forward. Her nose collided with a solid, wooden surface, and she heard a _crack_. She jumped back and clutched a hoof to her nose, and she crumpled to the floor. Her rump thumped against some kind of wall, and a few books fell on her head, stunning her. _What in the..._ It took her a moment to return to her senses and actually see what was going on. Gone was Ponyville beneath her rushing past at dizzying speed, and the cold wind; before her was a mahogany desk, in a dusty office, with the sun rising outside the window. Her flight suit was gone, and her nose was bleeding. She had so many questions about this situation that she didn't know where to begin.

Her nose started really smarting, so she decided to see to that first of all. She sat up and started looking around the desk handkerchief, or anything else that might help mop up the blood dripping from her nose. The desk was all business-looking papers and things like that - no luck there. The only interesting thing was a calendar, showing the date; March 12th, 1002. _Whew... still today. At least I haven't been out that long. _Drawer one: pencils, quills... drawer two: _Aha!_ A loose rag that looked like it might do the job. Hopefully it wasn't covered in beeswax. She hooked it on her hoof and held it to her nose, making a point to breathe through her mouth. When she looked back at the drawer, the book sat inside caught her eye. It wasn't often that a book caught her attention, but given how lost she currently was, she was looking anywhere for answers. Carefully, she lifted it from the drawer and sat it on the desk. The cover was emblazoned with the writing, _Chronicles of the Revolution_. It was a vague hope, but there was an outside chance it might shed some light on the situation.

_Let's see here..._

_"September 17th, 1001. I, Rainbow Dash, have started this diary because what I think is coming in the next few weeks will be important enough that it needs writing down. I know writing isn't usually my thing, but... this is something I need to keep private. Princess Celestia is freaking out over something... nopony knows what, not even Twilight. This could end really, really badly." Huh. I don't remember writing this..._

_"September 22nd, 1001. This is bad. Twilight's been recalled to Canterlot, and there's Royal Guards everywhere for some reason. And they're being really mean! Fluttershy was just going about her daily business, and they shoved her out of the way when they passed. Then they yelled at her, calling her a stupid peasant, and well, being Fluttershy, she ran away crying. Something's definitely wrong." That's real weird..._

_"September 24th, 1001. Well, there's another tax hike. I swear, it's like every bit I get paid goes straight back to the Princess. Just what the hay is going on here? Well, I shouldn't complain I guess. Applejack has it way worse - she's paying taxes through the nose AND the harvest is down this year. I hope she can break even this year..."_

_"September 27th, 1001. Okay, that's the last straw. Today, Royal Guards went over to Sweet Apple Acres to collect taxes, they couldn't pay, and they took Big Macintosh away! Applejack tried to stop them, but then they beat her up! Enough is enough. If the Princess is gonna start messing with my friends, she's messing with me." Oh no..._ She started shaking a little. _Something is really, really wrong with this._

_"October 1st, 1001. It's begun. Today, the Royal Guards went into Sugarcube Corner to collect taxes, and we jumped them. Me and Pinkie. It was messy, but they won't be collecting taxes anymore. I'm... not happy about what I had to do... but I don't see any other way. Long live the revolution." What... when did this happen?_

_"October 2nd, 1001. They took the Cakes away for questioning over the missing Guards. Pinkie's... taking it weird. It's like the happy part of her shut down, and she's really focussed on getting them back. Applejack is on board too, and Fluttershy is helping us, even if she stays inside her house most of the time these days. No word from Twilight yet. Rarity's been keeping to herself a lot lately. She's the only one of us who's been doing well in the last few weeks, I see dresses coming out of the Boutique all the time, being shipped to Canterlot. Makes me sick. Long live the revolution."_

_"October 8th, 1001. I've left it a while since my last entry, because so much has happened! Everything changed this week._

_First of all, we're not the only ones in this. A bunch of other ponies feel as strongly about this as we do. Cheerilee, Carrot Top and Derpy Hooves have all joined the cause here in Ponyville, and we're getting word of revolutionary cells in Hoofington, Trottingham and Manehattan. Appleloosa have just completely cut themsleves off, and Fillydelphia is just anarchy right now. The only place Celestia still has a grip is Canterlot._

_Second, I think we've lost Twilight and Rarity. Twilight came to town a few days ago flanked with Royal Guards, and she had a nifty new uniform. I kept my distance, but from my cloud I could hear the Guards addressing her as 'inquisitor'. And Rarity, well... she just packed up and left Ponyville, taking Sweetie Belle with her. She just said she didn't feel safe here anymore. Applebloom and Scootaloo are heartbroken. I don't think we'll be talking much to Twilight or Rarity again._

_Third... well, Rarity was right about it not being safe. The day after she left, riots broke out. Bread from Sugarcube Corner ran out, and it just spiralled out of control from there. We didn't start it, but we fanned the flames. We burned the library, and the boutique. The town hall currently a pile of rubble in the middle of the town. Mayor Mare fled... I don't think she made it. Ponyville is ours now._

_Long live the revolution." _Dash struggled to contain her nausea. Was this real? Was this just some mean prank? Was she dreaming? She dreaded reading further.

_"October 12th, 1001. I'll be brief. We're readying our final assault on Canterlot. The Princesses will hang, and Equestria will be free of their tyranny. Long live the revolution."_

_"October 14th, 1001. It happened. We won! With sheer force of numbers, we were able to storm Canterlot and capture the Princesses. Neither of them looked anything like I remember... instead of bright white and brilliant night blue, they were both kind of... grey. Doesn't matter. They were both defiant to the end, and it took every unicorn we had to hold them down. We gave them until dawn to come to their senses, but neither could be reasoned with. They were both beheaded at sunrise. It wasn't our preferred option, but we couldn't hold them captive forever. So rather than be stuck with eternal day or eternal night, we compromised. The sun and moon haven't moved since._

_As for Twilight and Rarity... Twilight got away. She's in hiding somewhere off to the west, but I don't think it's worth hunting her down. Rarity's in the dungeon. Serves her right for making huge profits off her dresses while we were starving._

_What happens now is anypony's guess. Equestria needs a new leader, one that will stand by the common ponies and protect them from this kind of abuse. A new way of doing things. No more Princesses... this will be... common... commony... communism! That sounds pretty neat. Communism."_ She began to sweat. _Tell me this isn't me. Tell me this isn't me._

She closed the book over and started hyperventilating. She could sense no immediate, clear danger, but she was nonetheless in a state of panic. To her left was the window of the room. Outside were white and gold coloured spires, and a forest valley below - it looked like the view from a tower in Canterlot. Off to the east was the sun, just peeking over the horizon, perfectly static. She put the book back in its drawer, and lay her forehead on the desk, trying to think. At least her nose wasn't bleeding anymore.

She turned around and took a few deep breaths. When she opened her eyes, she jumped in fright again. Staring back at her on the wall behind her was a painting. A pegasus pony, sitting down with her head held high and her wings flared out, wearing what looked like a military uniform. It wasn't a uniform that she recognised - none of the gaudy gold armour that the Royal Guard wore. It was like an olive green jacket, and a peaked cap of similar colour, with a red stripe running around it. There was a gold star in the middle of the cap, and another one on the breast of the jacket. She shuddered when she recognised the pony wearing the uniform. Pale blue, with all the colours of the rainbow present in her mane, and magenta eyes, framed by a piercing, determined expression. It was her.

"No, no, _no!_" She growled, thumping her head on the wall. _This has to be one of your tricks, Discord. It has to be._

"Everythin' alright in there sugarcube?" She heard Applejack call from outside. She clapped a hoof to her mouth to stifle her shriek of surprise.

"N..." _Fine. I'll play along for now._ "nn.. yeah! Everything's fine." She replied, trying to keep her voice from wavering.

"Alright..." She heard Applejack walk away. She breathed a sigh of relief, and returned to her contemplation.

_Okay, think, Rainbow Dash, think. Recap here. We were sitting in the field, then Discord showed up, then I flew away real fast... and then suddenly I'm a violent revolutionary, and the past is different. Hmm... what was it he said... 'See you on the other side'? Is this what he meant? Where am I?_ She looked around the room for clues once more. It was just a boring office. _Twilight might know._ _I just gotta find her..._ She looked out the window to the perpeptual sunrise, calculating motion vectors in her head. That diary was six months old; there was no telling how far she could have gone in that time, and 'west' wasn't very specific. Still, she had no other leads; she nosed the window open and jumped outside.

* * *

><p>She figured that she'd be instantly recognisable if she just bolted for the dark side of the sky; her rainbow trail was distinctive, and she was a public figure here. Nopony would be able to catch her if she was fast enough, but she'd have to slow down some time. Opting for discretion, she pulled her tail up between her legs, and fluttered up to the cloud layer. She grabbed a decent-sized chunk of cloud and pulled it over herself. From an observer's point of view, she was a cloud with wings. <em>Now, don't fall asleep Dash, I know these things are comfy but we've got a job to do, <em>she told herself. She kicked away from the main cluster of clouds over the city, and headed West, towards the Dragon Mountains.

"Ugh, we never get paid enough for this. This sucks!" She heard a voice whinging a short distance away. She instantly tucked her wings into the cloud, and proceeded to drift.

"Quits yer blubberin'!" A gruff stallion's voice responded. They were getting closer. "Just be thankfuls yer not in the fields. The harvest was terrible last years, and Rainbow Dash ain't gonna takes kindly to another poor years." _No..._

"Pff. Implying years mean anything now."

"Whatevers. Now gets back to work!" She heard the beating of two sets of wings, one approaching her, one departing. She ran through all the possibilities in her head - they'd recognise her instantly, but then what would they do? Would they run scared? Would they report the incident to somepony? She had no idea.

"Still don't think I get paid enough for this." The first voice muttered. "Now where do you think you're going, little cloud?" He continued in a slightly more light-hearted tone. She felt inertia dragging at her. The weatherpony was moving her cloud back to the others. "There you go! Back with your friends." _They must be doing a mass movement of clouds. Hmm... I wonder..._ She waited for the movement to stop, and she pushed her head out to the edge of the cloud, so she could just about see through the last wisps of water vapour. The colt appeared to be working on his own, and was heading away from her. She stuck her head out and looked around, confirming this. She pushed on her cloud, and it came free of the pile. _Heheh, sucker. Didn't even stick it back on. _She drifted the cloud over to the colt, working intently on something. Quickly, deftly, she leapt into the air and then slammed her hind hooves on her cloud, emitting a loud _boom_ and a crackle as a lightning bolt ripped from it. The colt yelped at the little static shock to his flank, and zipped away to hide behind a nearby wall of cumulus. Dash just chuckled, hid inside her cloud again, and started drifting away from the sun.


	3. Wild, Wild West

_I can see what Discord meant about a good coat now..._ As Rainbow Dash headed west, away from the sun, the temperature started to drop sharply. Only ten miles from Canterlot, she was already seeing frost on the ground, and from the far side of the Dragon Mountains, twenty miles west of the capital, heavy snow coated the earth. Usually, temperature was no issue for the pegasus; pegasi work at high altitudes, and they become quite accustomed to the extreme temperatures of the upper troposphere. However, as she continued west, the chill really started to set in. Even she began to shiver after a while. On top of this, the consistent temperature difference was driving the prevailing wind. Piercing, icy gusts blew in her face the whole time, and thirty miles from Canterlot, her cloud just blew away. Fortunately she was, by then, beyond most civilisation. She carried on to the first village she saw, and dropped to approach on hoof.

There was a wall around the settlement, with a few towers at regular intervals. There were a couple of pegasus guards atop the towers, all looking rather sleepy, and wrapped up in warm, shaggy coats. They were ignorant enough of their surrounds that they barely batted an eyelid when she zipped over the wall in a single, flight-assisted leap, and tumbled into a bush. She gave them another minute to resume their semi-conscious vigil, and carefully pulled herself free. She scooted in behind a hut, where just around the corner from two ponies standing by a burning trash can. The ponies here were all wearing heavy coats and miserable expressions - she couldn't blame them. The sun hadn't touched this part of the world in months. She craned her neck to the corner and listened in.

"Morning."

"Hah. Morning."

"Any new unfortunates arrived today?"

"Just one, I think she's a transfer from the dungeon."

"Oh goody, pre-broken." _What are they talking about?_

"Oh wait! No, there's two. The dungeon one and a little filly."

"Poor girl. Nopony her age deserves that."

"Well, if we needed any more proof that Rainbow Dash has _completely_ lost it..."

"Shh! Keep it down, the warden might hear you!" _Warden? What is this place?_

"Heh. Or worse."

"Walls have ears."

"Right." They went quiet after that. _Well this is... interesting, but not getting me any closer to Twilight._ She shuffled away and around the back of some other huts to eavesdrop on a different conversation.

"Listen, Vinyl, if you keep trying to dig through this ground, this _ice_, they'll have to cut your hooves off! You just can't do it!" She heard from inside a hut, muffled as if from an interior room.

"I don't _care!_" came the screamed response, with the clatter of boxes and cups being knocked over. "I have to get _out of here!_" Dash gulped, and carried on to the next hut.

"You sleep alri- hold on, there they are with the new meat."

"Oh boy, more 'orientation'."

"Redheart, less of the attitude."

"Pfff." Some hoofsteps were heard. Sounded like four... maybe five ponies. A group in any case.

"_Long live the revolution!_" a stallion barked. The two other ponies who had been talking responded with a mumble that roughly resembled the same message. "Two new inmates arrived this morning. Both on personal mandate from Rainbow Dash." _I'm just the talk of the town, aren't I?_

"Okay, send 'em in."

"Hey! Careful, darling." A voice protested as she was roughly pulled inside. _Rarity!_

"Let's see here... yep, dungeon medical records check out. You didn't get too banged up in transit, no? Okay. You're good to go. Next?" Some more shuffling, and then a pause. "Okay, _what._"

"She's just a filly!"

"Personal mandate from Rainbow Dash." He replied flatly. "You know what you need to do."

"I... I can't do this. I can't do this to her. I-"

"If you don't, we can have you beheaded, and somepony else will do it anyway." Another pause.

"... fine. Let's get this over with. Doctor, save some of that surgical spirit for me, I'm gonna need some when I'm done with this."

"Wh... what are you gonna do?" The filly spoke nervously. The voice was familiar, but Dash couldn't place the face. The doctor took a deep breath.

"I... I think it's best not to think about it."

"Hop up here, kid." Pause. "Now, put this on and count backwards from ten."

"Uhmm... ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one. Did I do it right?"_ Agh, who is that, who is that..._

"Hold up a second... oh, for goodness' sake."

"Nurse, what's wrong?"

"Anaesthetic's out."

"You're kidding me! Sergeant, we can't do this today. Not until we get more in."

"She's a pegasus. She has to have her wings clipped as soon as she arrives." _What!_ "Don't look at me like that, I'm just doing my job, and you should do yours."

"Clip... my wings? What do you mean?" _That's... that's Scootaloo! Why the hay would I send her out here? This doesn't make any sense!_

"Okay, kid..." The doctor sounded considerably shakier. "... drink this. You're gonna need it."

"Uhm... okay... _blech!_"

"It ain't usually for drinking, but... well, you're gonna need it." He paused, as if contemplating something, or possibly taking a shot of the spirits himself. "N... nurse, hacksaw..." _Oh, Celestia, no..._ Dash recoiled in horror, biting her lip and awaiting the sound that followed with rapidly growing dread.

"_Aaagh!_" Scootaloo let out a gurgling, ear-piercing shriek. Dash thumped her head on the ground, choking back tears.

"Nurse, hold her down!"

"_Ahhh! Ah-ha-how!_" The filly cried out. Dash batted a hoof at the logs of the wall, part of her wanting to heroically burst in and rescue Scootaloo from her fate, the other part just wanting her to wake up from this nightmare. The screaming just continued, and neither of her wishes appeared to be coming true any time soon. With her mind caught up in the dilemma, her body took over, and she tore away from the camp to the hills, stealth be damned.

She flew as fast her wings would take her, in any direction, anywhere away from that place. Her body went into autopilot, while burning thoughts cascaded over each other in her head. She struggled to believe what her eyes and ears were telling her, paralysing her ability to make a decision. She felt marooned on a world not her own, her good name saddled with atrocities she wasn't party to. Unable to form a coherent thought, she just did what she knew best, and flew.

Dead trees and ice sheets whizzed past her, along with the occasional frozen remains of a village. The world passed in eerie silence, with only the moon to light it. The air temperature dropped steadily, and her wings quickly went numb. It wasn't long before the mounting cold and fatigue got to her, and she lost altitude. Her front hooves hit the snow, creating differential drag, sending her into a high-speed somersault. Unable to keep a steady course, she quickly crash landed, half-burying herself in the snow. She groaned, and consciousness departed her.

* * *

><p><em>Ugh... my head. My... everything. What happened?<em> Rainbow Dash opened her eyes, though it didn't do much good. Her surroundings were still quite dark, and her bleary vision obscured detail. She went to sit up, only to find this odd resistance to her movement. She was still a little numb from cold, so she couldn't exactly make out the texture of what it was. She went to speak, emitting a strained croak;

"H... hello? Anypony there?" Slowly, her senses were sharpening, and she could just about make out the reply, and its source.

"Oh. Awake already."

"Tw... Twilight?" Her vision had cleared enough to take in the whole scene. It was a small cave, maybe only four lengths across, with stone floors and icicles hanging from the ceiling. Two sheets of heavy, rough fabric had been hung across between the walls of the cave, turning this part into a makeshift room. In the centre of the "room" was a small fire, about a length away from her, crackling away. Just the other side of the fire sat a lilac unicorn pony, a blanket pulled around her, and a book in front of her.

"Hm. Good to know you remember me."

"_Twilight, thank Celestia you're h-_" Dash went to rise and hug her, but instead, she just shifted in place, rolling from one side to the other. Twilight raised an eyebrow. "... ere? What's this?"

"A precaution." She replied, deadpan. Dash wriggled a little in place and inspected herself. Ropes bound her legs together, and her wings at their sides.

"Why... oh, wait." She remembered the diary. "Okay. That makes sense."

"So. What are you doing out here? Come for me personally?" Twilight snorted.

"I..." Rainbow Dash looked at the ground and thought. _How in Equestria am I gonna get her to believe me?_

"If I wanted a one-sided conversation, I could have just left you out there, Rainbow. I'd like an answer."

"Okay, this is gonna sound crazy..."

"You want me to move the sun? Is that it? Come _crawling_ back?" Twilight smirked. "Do you have _any_ idea how _impossibly_ hard that is?"

"Twilight, listen to me!" Dash snapped. "Let me finish. You're either gonna believe me or you're not, I'll... leave that up to you. But I swear to Celestia this is true."

"Hah. Why are _you_ of all ponies swearing to Celestia?"

"I said _let me finish! _I'm getting to that."

"Hm. This is gonna be good." Twilight chuckled, and laid her head on her front hooves, closing her eyes and leaning towards the fire.

"I don't really understand what's going on myself, so all I can do is tell you what I've been through. An hour ago... an hour before I crashed in the snow, I mean... I was in Ponyville. And it was morning, like, a real morning, with the sun up in the sky, and the Princesses were there. Well, not there there, but they were alive. And you were there, and so were all our friends, but then Discord showed up, and he... he turned Fluttershy into a bird, and Rarity into a cat, and Applejack into stone... and then he turned Pinkie Pie against us, and we had to run away... I don't know where you went, but then I flew away... I flew faster than I'd ever flown before, way faster than when I did the Sonic Rainboom, and then everything whited out, and when I woke up I was in Canterlot, sitting at some office..."

"Who's Discord?" Twilight asked at a pause.

"You... don't know Discord?" Dash furrowed her brow. Twilight just shook her head. "Huh. Everything else is different, why not that..."

"Rainbow, I think what you had there was a dream about the old times. I get 'em all the time. Probably more than you, since I can't exactly distract myself by sending some innocent pony to the work camps."

"But it's _not _a dream! I... don't remember anything about this place. I don't remember the revolution, I don't remember being a ruler of anything, the work camps, having a worse reputation than Nightmare Moon, _nothing!_"

"Hm." Twilight opened her eyes, and watched the fire, thinking. "Is it..." She glanced to the side, at a box at the back of the cave. "It couldn't be..."

"What?"

"You said you were flying faster than you've ever flown before." Twilight asked, turning her head back to look at Rainbow Dash. Dash nodded. "Was there... anything else unusual about that flight?"

"Oh. Yeah, you'd made this flight suit for me, and it made me fly faster. I probably couldn't have..." Twilight's eyes lit up, and she cut Dash off.

"Oh my gosh, _it worked!_" Twilight sat up in her blanket, and it rolled off her. On the ground between her front legs was a battered old doll with dreadlocks and blue polkadot pants.

"... what worked?"

"The flight suit! It actually did it! I never had a chance to test it, but your Twilight did and it _worked!_" Twilight started pacing around the fire.

"Eh... ya lost me, Twi. Backtrack."

"Okay, sorry, I shouldn't get ahead of myself. The flight suit was an idea I've had for a long time, ever since the Young Fliers contest. Basically, there's this hypothesis I'd been playing with, about one of the great unsolved mysteries of modern arcanology, but nopony had ever been able to investigate it because incredibly high speeds are involved."

"Which... is where I come in?"

"Exactly. The purpose of the suit was twofold, the first you know about - it uses magical means to enhance your natural speed, so you can get up to the speeds necessary. The speed of light to be exact. The second is a bottled spell that plays a role in coordinating the, well... the destination. Rainbow Dash..." She chuckled a little. "You've just travelled between universes."

"... _what._"

"You've confirmed the theory I was testing. You broke the light barrier, and travelled to another universe."

"Okay, now I _know_ I'm dreaming."

"It sounds crazy, but from what I know, it's highly probable." Twilight beamed.

"Well... neat, I guess. Does that mean you can untie me now?"

"Oh! Sorry." The ropes uncoiled by themselves, emitting a faint lilac glow, and Dash sprawled on the floor. As soon she pushed herself up from the ground, Twilight jumped over and threw her front legs around her.

"_Oof..._ uhm... good to see you too, Twilight..."

"Sorry... it's just been a long time. A long time since I last saw another pony... even longer since I last saw you..." Twilight sat back and wiped a tear from her eye. "... and longer still since I last saw you as a friend."


	4. The Eternal Twilight

Twilight threw another log on the fire and settled in under her blanket again. Rainbow Dash was fine with just the warmth of fire.

"So... what are you doing all the way out here?"

"Exile." Twilight sighed. "I fled Equestria after the revolution. If I'd stayed, I would have been arrested and executed. Or worse, thrown into one of the prison camps."

"So that's what that place was..."

"You... you passed one on your way out here?" Twilight frowned. Dash nodded. "So you know what I'm talking about?"

"Yeah..." Dash shuddered, echoes of Scootaloo's screams still lingering in her mind.

"You see why I'm hiding out here then. I was on my way to Appleloosa when the moon stopped moving. The sun didn't come up that day, so that's when I knew the Princesses were dead." Twilight gazed forlornly into the fire. "I found this cave nearby and settled in for a long winter. My supplies lasted me about a month, and by the time I had to come to the surface, everypony had already left. Villages, towns, just abandoned. Ponies just left to go where the sun still shines."

"Don't... uh, didn't the Princesses just pull the sun and moon around in the sky? Like, physically?"

"Oh, heavens no, neither of them have the strength for that. They have a special, subconscious connection with this world, this system, so that as long as they live, the sun and moon keep moving across the sky. Which is why when they were slain, they stopped. Typical, short-sighted Rainbow Dash..."

"Oh... sorry..."

"Don't worry, it's not your fault. It wasn't you."

"That reminds me, if I'm me in _this_ Rainbow Dash's body... where's your Rainbow Dash?"

"She's back in your universe." Twilight turned to see Dash tilting her head in befuddlement. "I'm not a hundred percent sure why this happens, but when you reach light-speed, certain things with a high electrical density swap with their counterparts in the other universe. As far as I know, this is just the brain, and metal objects." Dash nodded, pretending to understand, and laid her head back down. "Aren't you worried? There's a psychopath on the loose that your friends think is you!"

"They've... got bigger problems." Dash frowned.

"Oh... Discord?"

"Bingo."

"Tell me about this... Discord."

"Heh... ain't this a turnaround?" Dash chuckled. The irony was lost on this Twilight. "Well, I'm not an expert, but from what Tw-... my Twilight, and my Celestia have told me, he's a really ancient monster called a Dracony... Draconecue... something like that. But he's some Lord of Chaos or something, and was trapped in a statue in the Canterlot gardens, until some deal with the Elements of Harmony and the Princesses meant he escaped, and started causing all this trouble, like cotton candy clouds that rained chocolate milk, crazy stuff like that. He started hypnotising us to act all weird, like, Applejack started lying, Fluttershy was being really mean, Rarity thought this giant boulder was a diamond, heheh..."

"What about you?"

"_Anyway_..." _Moving swiftly along..._ "We managed to pull through and seal him in a statue again. Or, so we thought. See, that was all six or seven months ago. September, I think. And then today he turned up when we were about to test the flight suit, started playing his tricks again, only it got dangerous, and that's when I ran away and ended up in this universe."

"Hmm... September... that's when the revolution started. When the Princesses started acting really paranoid, for no particular reason. I wonder if they're connected... our universes were indentical up until that point, so it should be safe to assume that if your universe has a Discord, ours does too..."

"And the last pony crosses the finish line!" A voice called from somewhere, accompanied by a slow clapping. Both Twilight and Dash looked around in as much confusion as surprise, until they eventually spotted the source; slouched on a plush, velvet couch, mounted on the ceiling, was what could adequately be described as the most bizarre thing Twilight had ever seen. Its head was vaguely equine in shape, with a knobbly blue horn and a single antler between its ears, and a big tuft of white hair on its chin. The rest of its body seemed like a patchwork of all different kinds of creatures - attached to a serpentine form were a lion's paw, a gryphon's claw, a pegasus wing and a bat wing, one hoofed foot, and a dragon's hind leg and tail.

"_Discord!_" Dash jumped to her hooves, spreading her legs wide in a confrontational stance.

"_That's_ Discord?" Twilight boggled at the draconequus. Discord snapped his fingers, and with a little flash of light, he disappeared from the ceiling, reappearing next to them, sprawled on a towel with an iced drink and a pair of sunglasses.

"Like what you've done with the place?" He grinned, looking at Dash.

"This _wasn't me!_" She yelled.

"Really? I don't see any other bad-tempered, multicoloured pegasi around, comrade." With another click, the peaked cap from the painting appeared on her head. She immediately shook it off and tossed it into the fire.

"What did you do, Discord?" She barked.

"What did _I_ do? I'm afraid the material evidence is very much against you, Rainbow Dash." Discord chuckled. "I don't hear parents warning their foals that Discord's going to eat them up if they misbehave. That honour is, I'm lead to believe, yours."

"You're wrong, and I _know _you're wrong!" Dash screamed back, her face a bright red. _Click._ The sunglasses and towel disappeared, and a judge's wig appeared on his head.

"Objection overruled!" He replied, brandishing an oversized wooden mallet that made squeaky noises when he whacked it on a mahogany desk he called up from thin air.

"Enough games, Discord, you're not fooling anypony!" Twilight glowered. _Click. _The assorted junk disappeared and he just lay on his side, resting his head on his paw.

"See... you sound mad. Are you mad? Because you sound mad." All he got in return was two hard stares. "Oh, your faces are just _priceless!_" He chuckled, and pulled up a pocket watch from nowhere. "Well would you just look at the time..." He showed the face of the watch to them briefly. In place of numbers were twelve identical pictures of his own face. "I simply _must_ be going!" He started to circle the pair on a cloud of mist, grinning malevolently. "I may be leaving you for now, but I'm sure I'll be seeing more of you later..." With a mad cackle, he dove into the fire and disappeared completely. As suddenly as he arrived he was gone, leaving just the crackle of the fire and two stunned ponies.

"Well, that was... interesting..." Twilight grimaced, pulling her blanket back over her shoulders.

"Hmmm..." Dash muttered a few things to herself. "See you on the other side... seeing more of you later..."

"What was that?"

"What if... what if Discord is able to jump universes at will? Just before I left he told me he'd 'see me on the other side', and... there he is."

"That's... it's plausible. And that's what I'm afraid of." Twilight grimaced, and walked over to some of her boxes. She opened one, and pulled out a dust-covered suit.

"The flight suit!" Dash gasped. "You built it here too?"

"I had planned on using it myself with the aid some kind of flying machine, but I think we've found a better use for it now." She laid it out and started tinkering with the machinery implanted into the suit's chest. "This is just a hunch right now, but I think Discord might be causing problems in many universes. And the only way to know for sure is if you jump to a third, and investigate Discord's influence there, if any."

"What? Uhm... okay..."

"I'll do some more digging here to investigate how the revolution came about, but that's largely just for my own information. If Discord has interuniversal travel among his powers, then we've all got a _big_ problem, and we need to do something about it."

"Do what? The Elements of Harmony didn't work!"

"I... I don't know. But there has to be a way. You... might want to get comfortable here, it might be a few days before the suit's ready to use."

"Aw, hay..."

* * *

><p>Many hooves made light work for the pair. With Rainbow Dash around, Twilight could focus on preparing the suit, while Dash made surface runs to scavenge food and fuel. Even though she was providing for two, she was faster and more tolerant to the cold (when she wasn't flying at top speed), making her more efficient at it than Twilight could ever have been. There was nopony out here for miles - at least nopony alive. Occasionally, amidst the forests full of trees frozen solid, there was the remnants of a village, houses all boarded up, and the front doors blocked up with three feet of snow. These villages were normally rich in supplies - the perpeptual winter here was like a giant freezer, and any food she found was quite fresh. However, so were the bodies of any ponies unfortunate enough to be left behind. It absolutely freaked her out the first time, but slowly she got used to it. It worried her a little how desensitised she was becoming to these disturbing images, but every time she thought about it she pushed it out of her head.<p>

During one such soujurn to an abandoned village, she heard a voice. It was a little tricky to make out; slightly distorted, as if over a poorly connected telephone.

"Hello?" She nearly jumped out of her skin with the fright.

"What? Hello? Is somepony alive in there?" She started looking around frantically, trying to locate its source.

"Hello! Rainbow Dash!"

"What the... Twilight?" She kept scanning the surroundings, but the origin of the sound wasn't becoming any clearer. It was almost as if it was coming from inside her head.

"Rainbow Dash, can you hear me?"

"Yeah, I can hear you." _What in the hay are you doing, Twilight?_

"It works! What I'm doing is broadcasting an interuniv...al signal from home! F...ur universe!" _This is totally the wrong Twilight. _"Funny you sho...d say that, I wasn't sure if I had the right Rainbow D...!" _Wait... you can hear my thoughts?_ "Well I'm hearing something, so keep up whatever it is you're doing." _Uhm... okay. Don't mind me if I interrupt you with total non-sequiturs then._ "Hah. Anyway, I've managed to get away from Discord long enough to set up a sort of exclusion zone, where I've been able to work on this com...on spell. How are you doing? Where are you?" _I'm fine. Terrible. I mean... ah, heck. I'm totally going to embarrass myself like this. But yeah, I'm alive anyway. I was able to find this place's Twilight, and she explained everything. _"Excellent! That saves me a lot of work." _Though there's... something weird with this place. About the same time Discord showed up for us, the Princesses here started freaking out and then... _"You can tell me the details later, Rainbow. You've... I mean, your counterpart from that universe has been... let's say difficult, but informative." _If you did anything to _my _body, so help me Celestia..._ "Don't worry, your body is fine. You'll just wake up in some high-grade ethereal restraints when you get back." _Kinky. Wait, I mean..._ "Oh-hoh-hokay, I think you're starting to ramble now so I'll wrap this up, I can't keep the ...nection going for too long..." _Ah hay... _"You can't come home y...sn't safe. I'm trying to think of something, but I nee...ore time. Just stay alive and I'll get ba... you!" _Twi, you're breaking up, can you run through that again?_ "Ugh... stay wher... are, wait for m...lk to you again! I repe...y where you ...it for me to tal..." _Twi? Twilight?_ Silence. _Rats. She's gone._

Rainbow Dash shook her head and resumed her foraging. She wasn't entirely sure whether what had just happened was real, or just a hallucination, but with the abject strangeness of the last 48 hours, she wouldn't be surprised by either. She decided to keep the exchange to herself, and treat her Twilight and this Twilight as separate ponies. She also figured that she should give these alternate realities names to help her distinguish them... but she'd have to think about that. The best she could come up with for the time being was that she was from Equestria Prime, and she was currently in Commie Equestria. She'd find better names later. All she got from Twilight Prime was 'wait'. She could deal with that - go along with Commie Twilight's plan and wait for further instruction. Whatever there was in the next universe, it had to be warmer than here.

* * *

><p>"Alright Rainbow, we're good to go." Twilight powered up the suit, and it hummed into life. Dash staggered a little when its movement-altering capabilities kicked in. The two ponies looked up to the clear night sky. The wind was light, blowing to the east, where the sky was filled with the faintest glow of a distant sunrise that would never come. Dash had waited about three days for this moment; though with an unmoving sun and a host with no clocks, time was impossible to tell accurately. "You'll have to fly south if you're coming back this way. After your mind makes the jump, the body will have come down somewhere. Head west and it'll freeze to death, east and it'll fry. Either way, it'll be too dry to fly out of there." Dash gulped.<p>

"Alright. I'm... just curious..." She cocked her head. "How many universes are there?"

"Infinitely many. Uncountably many."

"Then... how will I know how to get back?"

"They're..." Twilight looked in the corner of her eye, searching for a word. "... arranged, shall we say, in a line. In any given universe you can only travel to the two either side." Dash breathed a sigh of relief. Normally such a tidbit of information would fly right over her head, but every little help in getting home was critical here. "In any case, you can probably get through to any other Twilights you meet. Just start explaining about the flight suit and they should understand."

"Got it." Dash nodded, and flared her wings, preparing to take off.

"Just... if you don't come back..." Twilight sighed, putting a hoof on Dash's shoulder. "... it was nice talking to Rainbow Dash again."

"Thanks..." Dash smiled. They hugged, and wordlessly, she took off and headed nearly straight up, with a slight inclination to the south.

"Celestia-speed, Rainbow..." Twilight muttered to the silent snow, alone once again.


	5. Underground Railroad

Rainbow Dash jerked forward and gasped. Despite her mental preparations for the jump, it still caught her off guard. At least there wasn't anything in the way to snub her nose on. It was chilly, but much warmer than where she'd just come from. She could feel soil underhoof and damp leaves on her back. She could barely see a thing - just the stars above and a few dimly lit things in front of her. As her eyes adjusted to the darkness, she was able to pick out a few shapes in the half-light - trees, bushes, a few bits of park furniture. _Whew. Normality. But what the hay am I doing out here..._ There were two ponies beside her, one on each side, both hunkered down in the bush with her. It took her a few moments to attach names to the silhouettes. To her left, looking around the corner of the bushes was Twilight Sparkle, searching for something with a determined face. Fluttershy cowered behind her, quivering. _Well would you look at that!_

"Twilight, I..."

"_Shh!_" As soon as Dash started talking, Twilight jammed a hoof in her mouth, and returned to her business. _Oh boy! What went wrong here..._ "Alright, let's move." _Best just play along for now._ Twilight stepped out of their hiding place, and trotted briskly towards some other mystery waypoint, being careful to keep away from the light. There were some things slung over her back that she couldn't quite identify. Dash did her best to keep quiet as they moved on, but something attached to her front hooves made her step heavier than she would have liked. Again, it was much too dark to figure out what it was. She looked over her shoulder to see Fluttershy bringing up the rear, her head low to the ground. Their party comprised just three.

They continued to another small grove of bushes, equally sheltered. Twilight double-checked every way in to the small enclosure, and when she was satisfied they were safe for the time being, turned to the other two. "Alright everypony," she whispered, keeping low to the ground. This prompted Rainbow to crouch like her; Fluttershy was tucked in on the ground anyway. "There's been a little change of plans. Before we continue our mission, we're making a little pitstop."

"Pitstop?" Dash queried, trying to sound authentic. She had absolutely no idea what this mission was, but she might as well keep her cover for as long as she could.

"The library. There's a few things I left behind on my way out that I'd rather keep." Her tone stayed flat and focussed. Dash looked over the edge to sneak a glimpse of the skyline. She could just about pick out the clock tower on the schoolhouse and the spire of the town hall over the assorted thatched roves, and sure enough, the library was just across the road. _Well, at least I'm in Ponyville. That's a start._ "Fluttershy, you stay here and guard the cache point, Rainbow, you and me will head inside, we're the fastest." Fluttershy nodded reluctantly. Dash flared her wings, smirking. Twilight took the hint, and started towards the library.

The streets were empty. Nothing unusual at this hour - everypony was probably in bed. Dash still couldn't figure out for the life of her why they were sneaking around like this, but she played along regardless. Twilight winked inside and opened the balcony door for Rainbow, minimising any evidence of intrusion. The inside was a mess - clearly, the last time she was here she'd left in a hurry. Books were strewn everywhere, many of them ripped, crumpled or otherwise damaged. She also guessed that quite a few were missing. Twilight flashed her horn briefly, and two things happened at the same time. First, panels of thick velvet appeared over the all the windows, shutting out the moonlight and plunging the room into darkness. Second, a pair of luminous orbs grew from the air above her, one of them hovering in place, the other moving to circle in the air above Dash's head.

"Neat." Dash whispered, lightly batting at the ethereal light, like a kitten with a ball of yarn. In the light, she was able to make out what was attached to her front hooves; mounted in a wooden stock, anchored by hempen straps at the fetlock and ankle, was a long, sharp blade. It ran from hoof to ankle, was slightly curved so as not to obstruct movement, and was never closer than an inch to her leg. She stifled a gasp, and reminded herself not to be surprised.

"Alright... it'll take me a few minutes to pick through these books for the important stuff, because _of course_ nopony's been in here to tidy up this mess. Rainbow, you go into the basement and look for a blue chest with yellow edging. Everything I want from down there should already be inside." Twilight instructed while she quietly leafed through the pile.

"Got it!" Dash saluted, and made her way to the basement.

The hatch on the ground floor was quite heavy - she guessed it was no trouble for Twilight, since all she had to do to open it was think about it. After a moment or two of trying not to wrench her jaw off, Dash got it open enough to stick a hoof inside, and from there it was easy enough to open the rest of the way. The trapdoor made a loud _thump_ when it swung down on the other side.

"_Careful!_" Twilight whispered harshly. _Yeesh, it's not like I can do it any other way._ Dash stepped lightly down the creaking stairs, and nosed open the door at the bottom. The little orb of light followed her down faithfully. She couldn't help but smile when she saw it hanging over her shoulder. _Heh. I like you. You're kinda like a puppy. A floating, glowing puppy._ She leaned her head inside the door, and the orb travelled forward a little, giving her light to see inside. _You need a name. I think I'll call you... Orby? Nah, that's dumb. How about..._ She casually strode inside and down the second flight of stairs, to where a bunch of tables and boxes lay in a disorganised fashion. There were metal cabinets on the wall, laden with all sorts of machines. _I know! I'll call you Gizmo._ _Okay Gizmo, find the chest! Go on! Good boy!_

Lo and behold, one of the first things to catch her eye after issuing this mental instruction to Gizmo (it didn't move) was an old chest, some fading blue paint on the planks and brass fittings on the corners and edges. She grinned and reached up to the orb to pet it like a dog. _Heh... maybe I am going crazy._ She dismissed the thought, and trotted over to the chest. It wasn't especially heavy for its size, but it was still pretty hefty. It wasn't too hard to slide it over towards the stairs, and while it was a considerable effort pulling it up the first few steps by her teeth, it wasn't much trouble pushing it up the rest in a more conventional manner.

However, something else stood out in the light on her way up. She had just reached the top of the first flight of stairs, when she saw something draped over one of the upended tables below. Intrigued, she left the chest for the moment, and descended to investigate. Gizmo followed at her shoulder faithfully. She pulled a hoof at the fabric, and a metal box swung over the edge of the table. _The flight suit! Good work, Gizmo! Now let's bring this to Twilight._ She grabbed the stomach of the cloth in her mouth and hauled it back up to the chest. She threw it over the lid, and started up the second flight of stairs.

At the top, Twilight was still sifting through books, neat little stacks emerging from the chaos. Dash chuckled. _Typical Twilight, too neat for your own good._

_Thud._

"_Rainbow!_ I told you to be qui-oh, the chest."

"Yeah." Dash snorted. Twilight looked up from her work and went over to the chest to double-check its contents.

"... what's this? I thought I said just to bring up the chest." Twilight raised an eyebrow, picking up the flight suit. Dash just smirked knowingly. Twilight paused, and went wide-eyed. "Wait... if you know what this is, then..."

"Yep."

"... how long?" Twilight went white under her fur, and her ears flattened back.

"About fifteen minutes."

"Oh..."

"Lemme take it from the top..."

* * *

><p>"You can't hide in there forever, you know." A deep, smooth voice taunted from behind a glowing, translucent yellow wall across a cave mouth. "You don't have to be omniscient to see that this... cavalcade of intensive spellcasting is taking its toll on you." A silhouette sat patiently outside, only his glowing orange eyes properly distinguishable. Behind him, Pinkie Pie surfed an alarmed-looking cow through the air.<p>

"I'll wait... for as long as it takes." Twilight snarled. Her horn ached a little, and there were bags under her eyes. Behind her, Rainbow Dash struggled with a series of blue beams of light, binding her hooves together and her wings at her sides.

"I think you'll find that I can wait much longer than you."

"We'll see about that."

* * *

><p>"... so that's <em>my<em> story, now I need you to tell me some things." Dash rested against the chest.

"Alright, shoot."

"What sort of mess is Equestria in right now? 'Cos I know _something_ is wrong, otherwise I wouldn't be sneaking around Ponyville with knives on my hooves."

"Simply put... civil war."

"What?" Dash tilted her head. "What's civil war?"

"It's... it's like Equestria is at war with itself. One half against the other."

"How did that happen?"

"Well... we're not exactly sure, but somewhere along the line, Luna turned bad again. Best guess is about six or seven months ago. But... it wasn't as simple as just banishing her again. Some towns rallied to support her, and the Princess wasn't about to banish half of Equestria. Ponyville was one of those towns. We were all going to leave, but... there were some divided loyalties."

"Oh..." Dash's ears flattened.

"Applejack was pretty adamant about staying in Ponyville. Not sure why, but the way she saw it, Celestia was the evil one. We all argued a lot, and eventually we just split down the middle. Three and three. Applejack, Pinkie Pie and Rarity all stayed in Ponyville, and you, me and Fluttershy left. It must be a Ponyville thing, since they were all born here and we weren't... I don't think I'll ever know for sure. But soon after, a confederation of towns declared themselves the Lunar Republic, and the Princess immediately declared war."

"That explains the sneaking around... but what are we doing here in the first place?"

"Well, as the three remaining Elements of Harmony loyal to Princess Celestia, and with our extensive knowledge of Ponyville, we were drafted in as special undercover forces."

"Special what forces?"

"We do the Princess' dirty work." Twilight flatbrowed. Dash grimaced. "Yeah, we weren't pleased about it either."

"I'm just thinking about Fluttershy..."

"It's... we've been there. We weren't leaving her behind because we're faster, it's... it's as much a protection measure as anything else." Twilight sighed. Dash shook her head and returned to her own predicament.

"Hmm... about six months, and something wrong with the Princesses... I'm seeing a pattern here."

"You think Discord might be involved?" Twilight frowned, folding up the suit with her magic and placing it inside the chest. She then lifted the chest and carried it behind her, extinguishing the orbs and peeling back the velvet window covers. _Aww, there goes Gizmo..._

"Maybe."

_Thump._ The sound came from the door. It was still closed, but the noise of cracking wood and failing screws said that it wouldn't stay that way for long.

"Shoot. We're out of time." Twilight flipped open the balcony door. "You go out that way and get back to Fluttershy, but _only_ if you haven't been spotted. I'll wink out and meet up with you when I can." Dash just nodded and shot out the open door. Behind her she heard a flash, and when she threw a glance back, both Twilight and the chest were gone. Outside, there were a few ponies in the process of breaking down the front door. She gulped and carried on away from the library to the park. _I hope you know what you're doing, Twi..._


	6. Behind Enemy Lines

"_Stop right there, criminal scum!_" Rainbow Dash heard. She looked over her shoulder to see a pegasus stallion chasing her - with his brilliant white coat, he looked like an ex-royal guard. He still had a helmet, but rather than the gold of Celestia's guards, it was a silver that shimmered in the moonlight. She instantly knew who this pony was loyal to, and shot away. "I said _stop!_" As she accelerated away from the library, his voice wasn't getting any quieter. The occasional glance over her shoulder revealed that he was hot on her tail. _Damn! I could really use that suit about now._ She grimaced, and steeled herself for a hard chase, the old-fashioned way. She headed straight for the Everfree Forest.

She had no idea what creatures were out and about at this time of night. She was pretty sure that Fluttershy had told her once, but she wasn't listening then, and she certainly wasn't going to remember now. Taking her life in her hooves, she dove for the tree-line.

_Crash._

She tumbled through the canopy, breaking a some branches on the way. The blades on her hooves helped slice through them, but a fan of leaves and twigs still slapped her in the face, disorienting her. In a split second she had reached the ground, and rather than executing a deft swerve to start zipping between the trees, she tumbled ungraciously to a halt, lying upside down against a tree. _Ow... at least I'm_... A rustling interrupted her train of thought. With her eyes, she followed her quickly dissipating rainbow trail up to the gaping hole she left in the canopy, just in time to see the stallion land with a _thump _in the clearing. _... never mind. _She panicked, scrambled to her hooves, and started clumsily sprinting into the forest.

She cursed under her breath; there was no room to take flight in here. Worse still, the density of trees and bushes made it difficult to pick up speed on hoof. All she was doing was clearing a path for her pursuer. Before long, she gave up trying to wade through the vegetation, and she spun around and spread her legs, lowering herself to the ground. _If it's him or me, then fine._

"_Come at me, bro._" She growled.

"Hah! I'll bet you don't even know how to use those things." The guard jeered, and flared out his wings. With the _slice _of metal against metal, two long blades emerged from devices mounted on his wings, reflecting a shine from the little moonlight that penetrated the leaves. _I am so in over my head_. Dash backed up against the tree, and lunged towards him, her front hooves outstretched. He jerked back quickly, hiding his face behind his bladed wings. Dash winced, and subconsciously crossed her front hooves. They formed a point, driving a wedge between the two wingblades. Steel grinded against steel, and Dash parted the wings to let her body through. Some alien urge made her spread her front legs and tuck her wings in, and in doing so, she pushed the two blades out of harm's way and launched into a tackle.

The impact winded the stallion and knocked him backwards. Dash's legs seemed to move by themselves, as if following some muscle memory that wasn't her own; she straddled his ribcage with her hind legs without even thinking about it. She paused for a moment to get her bearings, unsure what had just happened. The stallion was stunned, his wings lying limply on the ground. Her conscious mind was completely overwhelmed, and her sense of mercy was left to grapple with her self-preservation instinct and this foreign urge on its own. But when her captive regained his composure and flared his wings out again, the drive to survive won out. In a single deft movement, she swung her front hooves up, and then straight out. They slashed against the bones of his wings, between the wing shoulder and the carpal joint. She heard two loud _cracks _and a shriek of pain. The wings fell limply to the ground, and blood started dribbling out. Before she had time to think, she brought her hooves up again and swung them down. They dug into the interiors of his front legs, and in dragging the blades free, she left long, deep slashes behind. Blood started to spurt from the wounds, and the hooves went limp, minimising the risk of a blunt impact to her face. But her subconscious wasn't done with him yet - she brought her hooves up a third time, and swung powerfully towards his neck.

_Squelch._

The blades embedded themselves in the sides of his neck, and blood erupted from the gashes like fountains. He gagged a little, blood starting to fill his mouth, his movements fading to a weak twitch. He locked gaze with her for the briefest of moments, before his eyes rolled back in his head, and his head fell back limply.

Dash panted deeply, her conscious beginning to reestablish itself now that the threat had passed. Meekly, she pulled the blades free of her victim's neck, and inspected them in horror. Her front legs were coated in a congealing crimson from the ankle down. The fluid dripped off the metal, leaving only the shimmering steel behind, but stained her fur, darkening to scarlet the longer it was left. Little by little, the reality of the situation started to grip her. Tears started to cloud her vision, and she started hyperventilating.

"No..." She panted, trying to flick some of the blood off. She backed off the stallion's body, and noticed the spatters all over her belly, and where it had pooled against her hind thighs. "... no!" She flinched repeatedly, as if disgusted by the sight of herself. "_No!_" She screamed, and turned tail on the clearing. She tore away into the undergrowth, tears streaming down her face.

* * *

><p>"Rainb...w!" A distorted voice exclaimed. Dash paid it no heed - it was just another voice among the crowd in her head, screaming all manner of things. <em>Criminal<em>, some said. _Monster_, said others. None of them were especially nice. Except one. "_Rainbow Dash, can you ...r me?_"

"Wh..." Dash looked up. Her cheeks were stained with tears, and marked with a few cuts from her clumsy attempts to remove her weapons. She was perched in a tree beside a small lake, deep within the forest. She didn't know exactly where, and she didn't care. But still, this voice was calling her by name, so she thought she'd at least pay it the respect of an answer. "Who's there?"

"Rai...ow are you th...re? I'm getting a lot of b...nd noise!"

"... Twilight?"

"Hell...? Ugh, don't tell me I've got the wrong f...y again..." _What the hay is Twilight Sparkle doing in my..._ "Aha! There you a... I was worried I w...ting through to you!"

"What?" _Oh, right. Thoughts._ She sniffled and wiped her face. _Wait... Twilight! Twi, I... should I tell her? It might..._

_"_Tell who what?"

"... horsefeathers." _Ugh, well now I have to tell you I guess... I... I've done something terrible..._

"Wh... hold on, this background noi... getting worse..." _Twilight, I... I've killed somepony... _"Okay, you _wait, what!_" _You can hate me now..._ "Who did you have to kill? And why?" _This... this guard, he was following me, and..._ "Oh, so i...s self-defence?" _I... guess..._ "_Oh!_ You had me worri...ere!" She heard a distorted chuckle. _Wait... you mean you don't hate me?_ "No, no... I'm just glad you're okay, Rainb-... Honestly, I was expect... have to sooner or later. I guessed you might be in danger a...ve to defend yourself." _Oh, alright..._ Dash sniffed again, and wiped her nose. _If you say so... Can I go home now? I don't like it here..._ "Sorry, but no...et. I need more time." _Aww_... "Ugh, what is with this conne...ion? It worked fin...st time..." _Yeah, it's pretty terrible, I can barely hear you. Hmm... I wonder if it has something to do with that other jump I did... _"Oh. _Oh._ That explain...t." _What?_ "I wasn't expecting you to jump agai...ut okay." _It was Commie Twilight's idea._ "Who's Commie Twilight?" _The Twi from the last- oh, yeah, you weren't there... I started giving these different universes names. We're Equestria Prime, and the last one is Commie Equestria, and then this one is... what was it this Twilight said... Civil War Equestria, I guess?_ "Huh. That... works. Anyway, I've got some more dat...icked up evidence of other int...versal jumps besides yours. Some of them..." _Are Discord's?_ "... how did you know?" _A hunch. I bumped into Discord back in the last place, and he seemed to know who I was. Like... that I was me, not Commie Dash._ "Huh... inter...ting. I'll get back to you on that. For now, just_ stay alive._" _Got it._ "And... good luck, Rainbow..."

The distorted, crackly voice and its accompanying noise dissipated in her head. The other voices were gone. Dash blinked, and looked up at the moonlight. _Thanks, Twi..._

Sleep couldn't come quickly enough for her. Twilight's reassurance had sated her conscience for the time being, and she took full advantage of the quiet to find rest. Regardless, the sound of her own soft sobbing saw her to sleep.

* * *

><p><em>You're doing great, Scoot! Heh, maybe you're not so bad at this after all.<em> Dash watched the little filly fly around her, doing a circuit of some clouds. She smiled at the purple lightning bolt on Scootaloo's flank._ 'Thanks, Rainbow! One day I wanna be as good as you!' One day, kid. One day you might, _might_ get into the Wonderbolts like me. _She grinned, and adjusted her goggles. This flight suit was kinda itchy, and felt like it was missing the back half of it, but she wasn't inclined to care. _'Really? You really think so?' 'Stop right there, criminal scum!' _A third figure entered the scene. Scootaloo suddenly fell from the sky with a shriek._ 'Aaagh!'_ Dash went to catch her, but for some reason, the sky was solid, and wouldn't let her past. The third pony kept flying towards her. Instinctively, she bolted for him and tackled him to a cloud. Completely out of control of her body, her hooves started thumping against him, each impact releasing an eruption of blood and chilling scream. However much she wanted to stop, she couldn't. _No... no! I'm sorry! I'm sorry!_

"_I'm sorry!_" She yelled out. She looked up and around. The clouds, the pony and Scootaloo were gone. She was on a tree branch, in front of a lake, and the sun was just peeking over the horizon. It dazzled her, and she fell from her perch. Stunned, she failed to open her wings in time, and landed on the ground with a _thump_. She groaned as she clambered on to her hooves again, but was nonetheless relieved. "Whew... just a dream..." She sauntered over to the lake to splash some water in her face. When the ripples settled, she noticed the dried blood still caked in her fur. She shied away from her reflection briefly, before reluctantly returning to get a better look. Almost half of her front was stained a dark, rusty brown. She grimaced, the events of last night replaying in her head. _It's okay Rainbow... It was self-defence. You or him._ She shook her head to dispel the guilty thoughts and waded into the lake to get herself cleaned up.

To keep herself company, she chattered quietly to herself while she washed. "Okay, so. Twilight said to stay alive. Obviously staying here is _bad_, because there's plenty of ponies trying to kill me. Hmm... I could take my chances in the next universe over, or... actually, now that I think about it... it wasn't that bad with Commie Twilight. Sure it was cold, and lots of ponies were really mean, but... it was actually kinda nice in that cave." She smiled, ducking her head under the water wash her hair. The caked-in blood rubbed off her fur and floated away, leaving a rusty brown mist in the water. She continued her conversation with herself in her head. _Nopony bothered us. Well, except Discord, but what are you gonna do? _She resurfaced with a deep gasp for air, and floated into the middle of the lake. "Yeah. It wasn't that bad."

_Wait..._ She perked her ear. She thought she heard something. _That's... a voice._ She panicked, and dove into the water. _That... that was stupid, they probably saw me... _She thumped herself on the head, and looked for somewhere to hide. She spotted some reeds that looked like they'd do the job, and surfaced in the middle of the stand. She did her best to minimise the splash and stifle her gasp, but couldn't quite eliminate them. The stand was quite thick, however, so she reckoned she hadn't been seen. She silently pried a few of them aside to look for the source of the voices. It took her a few minutes of scanning the lakeside, but she soon found them - two Lunar Guardsponies combing the forest for something. A wisp of scarlet in the water beside her sent a chill down her spine.

_I need to get out of here._


	7. Geldingsburg

Rainbow Dash dove again, keeping the position of the patrol in mind. She kept to the bottom of the lake to minimise the chances of them seeing her; however, this also made it quite dark. She swam much like she flew; beating her wings in a circular motion. Except instead of frantic flapping, it was slow, powerful sweeps. Because she was built for flight and not swimming, she had a natural buoyancy to fight in order to stay submerged, but for a pony as athletic as her, this was a non-issue.

Of these two impediments, one distracted her enough from the other long enough for a third to arise. While trying to keep low, one of her hind legs caught on a rock in the darkness, and she yelped in pain. The sound was smothered by the water, but the release of air wasn't. She could only watch as bubbles floated effortlessly to the surface, and hope they didn't give her away. Her body wanted to rise with them and catch a fresh gulp of air, but she pressed on, and darted for the nearest shore she saw.

She broke the surface of the water a bit harder than she intended to. Eyes closed, she staggered ashore and started hacking up water, before collapsing and panting. _Smooth, Rainbow._

"Is that..." A male voice said. She twitched an ear. _That's not good._ She wiped her eyes and looked up to find the two guards boggling vacantly at her.

"Looks like her." _Looks like who?_ She blinked, and looked down at herself. While her washing had done wonders, there were still big splotches of rusty brown all over her. She looked back up and chuckled nervously.

"_Heheh..._ bye!" Without wasting another moment, she darted off across the lake and into the trees on the other side. She heard the two guards galloping to a takeoff, yelling at her to stop.

* * *

><p>"I'm really..." Fluttershy yawned, bumbling along behind Twilight Sparkle. Even in her exhausted, clumsy state, her step was still light and graceful. "... tired..."<p>

"I am too Fluttershy, but we can't rest until we find Rainbow Dash." Twilight groaned, scanning the trees they passed for any signs of blue. "Hmm... I'm pretty sure we passed this clearing before... are we going in circles?"

"I don't... know..." Fluttershy mumbled, hanging her head low.

_Crash._

"Fluttershy, get down..." Twilight ordered, her gaze fixed on the brightly coloured blur of fur and feathers tumbling through the branches into the clearing in front of them. Two large, white pegasus stallions slammed to the ground either side of her. "_Hey blockheads!_" She yelled. Both of them whipped their heads around with wild eyes. By the time they'd identified the source of the sound, standing in plain sight, less than five lengths behind them, it was too late. Fluttershy covered her ears, and shut her eyes tight.

_Crack._

With a split-second's flash of Twilight's horn, the two guards' heads jerked around, continuing their respective turning motions to an unnatural degree. They twitched for a moment, before crumpling to the ground, tongues hanging limply from their mouths. Dash groaned and struggled to her hooves. _They're down, I can make a br-_

"_Whoa!_" In mid-takeoff, she felt a sharp tug on her tail, and when she flapped her wings she went nowhere. She eased up, and without the lift from her wings, she swung down and hung by her tail. "Twilight!" She gasped. The unicorn let go, and Dash crashed to the ground.

"Are you alright, Rainbow? You're covered in..."

"That's, uh..." Dash cut in. "It's not mine." She grimaced.

"Oh..." Twilight bit her lip. "At least you're alright, that's... that's the important thing."

"Heh..." Dash chuckled, dusting herself off, and noticed Fluttershy whimpering on the ground. "Is she?"

"Yeah, she's fine, c'mon. We need to get back to Ponyville, we've lost a lot of time!" Twilight started back out of the forest, nudging Fluttershy on the shoulder as she went. The timid pegasus hesitantly rose to follow. Dash gulped upon noticing the two bodies, and made sure not to get left behind.

* * *

><p>On the way back to the town, Dash eventually had to lead the way. Twilight kept going the wrong way, or taking shortcuts that weren't there - she guessed by her bleary expression and heavily bagged eyes that they'd spent all night looking for them. She thought that was kind of nice, that even in this horrific alternate reality where her friends had turned on each other, the ones she still had were loyal. Nonetheless, it was scant consolation for the trauma she'd put herself through the night before. In idle moments, her mind kept wandering to the awful sensation of hot blood gushing out over her hooves, to the gurgling, guttural scream of the pony she'd killed.<p>

"So where did you leave the chest?" She queried, trying to distract herself.

"It was..."

"... right here, sugarcube." A familiar voice answered, interrupting Twilight. Both of them gasped, and looked around frantically for the source of the sound. After a few suspenseful seconds, savoured like a fine sauce, Applejack stepped out of the undergrowth. Her hat had a silver, crescent moon pin in it, and she wore an uncharacteristically malicious grin. Her coat and mane also seemed slightly less saturated than Dash remembered, more of a dull ochre than its usual pastel peach. "Lookin' for somethin'?" She jeered, and stepped aside to reveal the chest, tucked away in a small hollow in the ground, under a thick bush. Rarity, laying on top of the chest, pulled back her coiffure and smirked. Pinkie Pie just bounced out of cover and started prancing around the other three. Both of them sported similarly dulled colours.

"We caught you, we caught you, we caught you!" She giggled. "Now we hide, and _you_ seek!"

"Pinkie..." Applejack grumbled.

"Oh! Right. _Grrr!_" She stopped her merry dance and proned to the ground like a dog ready to pounce.

"Oh, please..." Twilight rolled her eyes, and her horn started glowing. A prod at her flank made her jump, and interrupted her spell. She looked over her shoulder to see the point of a lunar unicorn guard behind her, levitating a large spiked halberd in her vicinity. One-by-one, a number of other guards stepped out of cover with various armaments; spiked helmets, fetlock daggers, wingblades, all manner of devices ready to tear them to pieces if they so much as twitched the wrong way. Dash started to panic. _No, no, not again..._

"Now don't try anythin' stupid, Twi, it'd be a shame to have to put a 'friend' down." Applejack leered.

"You make me sick." Twilight scowled. Fluttershy just trembled and whimpered.

"Good to see you too." The earth pony chuckled, turning to the chest. "Now let's see what yer movin'. I'm sure the Princess is _dyin'_ to know what's so important ya have to steal from yerself!" Rarity rolled off the chest and opened it.

"Well, let's see here... oh my _goodness_, what is this _monstrosity!_" She exclaimed, pulling out the flight suit. Dash gasped, and leaned forward. A long, thin blade pushed in front of her made her think twice. "How can you wear this, Twilight? It's _hideous!_" Rarity taunted, tossing it in the dirt. "Now what else is in here..." She started sifting through some assorted possessions, mostly just books and mechanical devices, with the occasional bottle of oddly-coloured liquid and, interestingly, a ragged doll with blue polka dot pants. Twilight blushed a little when Rarity hauled it out and sniggered. _Gotta get that suit..._ Dash kept her eyes on it. By now she was at a total disregard for this version of her friends; they just simply weren't them. They merely happened to share their forms, and their voices, but at their black hearts they were intrinsically different ponies.

Which is why she had no qualms about rearing out to the side and kicking Twilight to the ground with a hind leg. The unexpected move distracted the guards amassed around her long enough for her to duck under the blade, and make a dive for the suit. Nopony was fast enough to stop her - in a single bound she dove for the suit and grabbed it in her teeth. By the time any one of them was making a move to catch her, she was already airborne, and speeding away with the suit hanging behind.

"Why that little...!" Twilight growled. "I charged that thing for her and everything! Element of Loyalty _my a-_"

"Well, I never!" Rarity cut in, standing up after Dash had knocked her over. A few guards took off after the shrinking blue dot in the sky, while Applejack just huffed and adjusted her hat.

"Well, two out o' three ain't bad, ah guess."

* * *

><p><em>Gotta... gotta get out!<em> Dash panted, her jaws clenched firmly around one sleeve of the suit. Twilight's words played over and over in her head. _Just stay alive... just stay alive._ She wasn't even sure if it was set up properly; but with a string of guards in relentless pursuit, she found herself running out of options. She headed for the mountains, and hoped to lose them in there long enough to wriggle into the suit.

She made straight for the nearest peak, just over Froggy Bottom Bog. She swung over the top of the mountain, pressing a hoof on the rock tip to help herself turn, and descended into a canyon system, wedged between the peaks, turning on a dime. She looked over her shoulder, and watched the guards swerve clumsily over the crest. An idea struck; she saw that their heavy armour impeded their ability to steer their flight, just by virtue of its weight. With a smirk, she dropped down into the gullies.

The canyons were narrow, but deep. At the bottom ran the rivers that supplied the water to Ponyville, and all their assorted tributaries. The system was a maze of open-topped canyons and enclosed caves - for a non-pegasus, it was all too easy to get lost in here. The walls were only five lengths long at the top, quickly narrowing to a single length halfway down. Dash skirted between these two margins, almost teasing her pursuers; one moment veering into reach, the next dropping near the halfway point, where it was nearly impossible to keep up speed. One misjudged distance, one poorly-timed blink of an eye, one errant flap, and it was all over. If a pegasus so much as clipped their wing on the wall at these speeds, the imbalance could send them face-first into the rockface, never mind what the impact would do to the mechanisms in the suit.

She only risked the briefest of glances to check on her lead; a couple were trying to descend, and getting left behind when they ran into hazards, and a couple of others were keeping up by staying up high. She knew they'd keep going until she tired out. She slowed up, and kicked off a wall to enter a cave.

She scuffed her shoulder on the way in. It stung, but it could have been a lot worse if she hadn't eased up. She'd traversed these canyons before - she knew there was no way she could keep up speed in the darkness of these caves. She dropped to a halt on the floor of the cave, and darted behind the biggest set of stalagmites she could find. The sunlight didn't go much further than the entrance here - there was no way of telling what was down there. As she sat panting, she felt two short blasts of cool air, and saw two of the white guards pass her by and disappear into the shadows. _Heheh, suckers._ She slung the suit over her neck and left the cave as soon as they were out of sight. Rather than risk the surface just yet, she went for another cave; the next one she could see, opening on the opposite wall, a length below the previous one. _Now..._ she thought, only now stopping to think. _How do I get this thing on..._

* * *

><p>It took her a good ten minutes of wriggling and writhing to slip in by herself. The last two times she'd had Twilight's help, which was particularly useful for the zipper on the back. That on its own ate up four minutes, spent awkwardly rubbing her back on the cave wall and craning her neck around to uncomfortable angles. By comparison, the goggles, attached to the suit by a cord, were simple to apply. <em>Heh. Yes Twilight, I am going to put those on myself.<em> She gave herself a pleased smile as she sat them on her forehead, and gave the chest box a whack. It hummed into life, and the movement effects kicked in. She staggered to the cave mouth and looked up. There were still a couple of guards sailing overhead, likely patrolling for her. She smirked knowingly - they didn't stand a chance now. _Time to get the buck out of here._

She shot vertically out of the canyons and into the cloud layer, the guards just noticing a blue blur rushing past them and spiralling away into the sky. She didn't know if any of them tried to follow her, but she knew that if any did, they wouldn't have a chance.

"Tea? Coffee? Peanuts?" A male voice spoke in her ear. It was calm, and shouted a little to be heard over the wind, but was nevertheless keeping up with her as she levelled off above the clouds. _What the... _Dash blinked and looked to the side. There, floating along beside her with a metal trolley, stacked with various snacks and drinks, and wearing a sharp, navy blue suit, was an unsettlingly familiar face. "Perhaps some _chaos?_" He grinned, removing a little bag from the trolley and ripping it open, releasing a bolt of lightning into the sky.

"_Discord?_"

"Are you enjoying your flight? We serve a wide variety of breakfasts, including oatmeal, salads and _unexpected crashes!_" The draconequus' casual tone gave way to a psychotic cackle, and with a click of his fingers, Dash's wings disappeared. She shrieked in horror as the horizon started to rise. She flailed her hooves around wildly, trying to get some sort of lift, any kind of cushioning. Her terror briefly subsided when she a cloud drifting into her path, only for it to return in full force when she passed straight through it. She saw another flash out of the corner of her eye, and the pull of gravity on her seemed to subside. She looked around to see her wings back where they were, perfectly intact. "Or if emergency landings aren't your thing, I'm sure there's something to your liking on the menu." Discord continued, nonchalantly examining his fingers.

"_Ugh!_" Dash groaned, and did her best to accelerate away from him. He just coasted to a gentle stop, letting her disappear into the distance, finally vanishing in a distant burst of light.

"I think you'll find that the emergency landing _may_ have been the better choice, Rainbow Dash..." He chuckled to himself.


	8. In A Heartbeat

_Hnn... cold... gotta get out of the cold..._ Rainbow Dash was scrambling across a plain of moonlit snow on hoof. She beat her wings every so often, but they weren't giving her any lift. _Gotta... get out... Huh?_ She turned her head to hear some high pitched noise behind her. It sounded vaguely like a squeal. _Hnnh... no time... gotta get out..._ The squeal repeated, only louder. She kept running, only to find her swagger becoming more and more uncontrollable, and it was only a matter of time before she found herself with a faceful of snow. The screams became more pained, more frequent and louder. They incapacitated her, and she just writhed in the cold, white powder with a mounting, paralysing terror.

* * *

><p>Dash sat sharply up, panting. She was dripping a cold sweat, despite the mild temperature of the half-lit room. <em>A room?<em> She looked around. It appeared to be a private room in a hospital. The blinds were down on the windows, blocking out the light from the outside. _Must have been a dream... gah, I should get that checked when I get home. Too much weird stuff going on. _She looked over her shoulder to check her wings, and breathed a sigh of relief to see them intact. The last time she was in here, she'd broken a wing bone and was groundbound for weeks. This was certainly _not_ the time for that. She quirked a brow at the monitoring machines - they were all set up correctly and hooked up to her, but none of them were working. It seemed too odd to just dismiss, but as her memories from before her sleep returned, her attention shifted to other matters. _Why was I asleep just now? How did that happen?_ She wondered. _Ugh. This is confusing. Gotta find Twilight._ She swept away the probes on her chest and belly, and made for the door.

The corridor was deserted. All the doors along it were shut, cloaking it in a similar half-light to the room she just left. She had a quick read of the clipboard in the slot on her door. _'Rainbow Dash. Experienced severe head trauma on February 24th, retained for rehabilitation. Displays impaired motor function, loss of vision and slurred speech. Probable brain damage.' Huh. I don't feel brain damaged... unless that's one of the things Twilight meant about the brain swapping over. Hmm.. if she's been holed up in a hospital for a month..._ She lifted a front hoof and looked down at her belly. It was noticeably softer than she remembered it being. She prodded the slight pudge, and it squished easily, revealing both an increase in body fat and a reduction in muscle. _Ah, hay... stupid hospital food. I guess I'll have to make do. _She frowned, and continued down the deserted corridor.

The window at the end of the hall was similarly obscured, curtains drawn and blinds pulled down. The nurses' station sat unattended. Dash waited for a couple of minutes, and listened out for any sounds, any signs of life. To her increasing discomfort, the only sound that greeted her was her own uneasy breath. She reached a hoof out and tapped the bell. With no answer forthcoming, she leaned over the counter to get a look at the desk behind it. Nurse Redheart slumped over it, unresponsive.

"Nurse!" Dash gasped. She prodded her gently. "Nurse, wake up!" There was no answer. Not even a breath. She pushed her again, harder this time. The earth pony slid backwards off the desk, and hit the floor with a hard _thump_. On the desk was a piece of paper, slightly warped by fluid that had since dried away, and an empty syringe. _That's not good._ Dash hopped over the counter to get a look at the note. She winced a little at the exertion - this body's poor fitness was showing itself. _Let's see here..._

_'To anypony who finds this... This is the end. I've barred the doors and blocked up the stairs, but I don't know how long they'll hold. The arcane batteries are about to go, and I haven't seen anypony alive in a week. The group that left with the last group of patients never came back... just as well the ones left are in comas, or too messed up in the head know what's coming. I have no way of telling if there's anypony left, anywhere... I'm giving up. This injection will be painless, and if it's worked right, I shouldn't turn when they bite. There's only enough for one, and... well, I don't think anypony else in here is getting up anyway._

_Goodbye.'_

Dash's heart sank as she followed the increasingly shaky writing. True enough, there was a puncture mark by Redheart's left front fetlock, and her body was ice cold. _Just what is going on here? Who are 'they'?_ She set the note down, and started looking for a way out.

* * *

><p>The rest of the hospital was just as quiet as the ward she woke up in - halls upon halls of silence. Most of the windows were covered over with something or other - she wasn't sure why. She caught a glance of the outside from a few that were missing their curtains. This was definitely Ponyville - she recognised the first-floor view, with a chemist on the opposite street. The streets themselves were barren - it was like they'd all just vanished. She pulled the window open, and leaned outside. Nopony at the hospital doors, and the skies were completely empty. She frowned, and pulled herself outside to do a flyover of the town.<p>

Her muscles were stiff, and her flight took a lot of work. She took frequent rest breaks on rooftops, stopping to look for any signs of life. Only desolation replied when she called.

She set down in the middle of the town, by a statue. She was panting heavily, and cursing under her breath. Amidst the pounding of her ears, she thought she heard some distorted crackling sound. It was a completely alien, sourceless noise, and she instantly recognised it.

"Twilight?" She muttered to herself. _I mean, Twilight?_

"R...sh! ...re?" _Twilight! Oh, am I glad to hear you..._ "...bo...r you, s..." _Or... sort of hear you. Can't make out anything._ "Da... ak... n't..." _One more time?_ "...sc...ow..." _Hello?_ "..." _Twilight?_ Silence. _Dammit. She's gone._

"What are you looking at?" Dash scowled, to a pony staring absent-mindedly at her. It had been standing there for a few moments, just shuffling around. "Wait a second... _another pony!_ Oh boy, that's a relief, what's going on? Where is everypony?" The earth pony looked quite injured, with blood dripping from her mouth, and a severe limp to her step. Again, Dash posed a question that was left unanswered. "Can... can you hear me? Where is everypony?" The pony just took a clumsy step forward. Dash took a step back. "Hello? _Answer me!_" The pony just lurched forward again, baring its broken teeth and emitting a breathy groan. Dash backed up against the statue, and started to panic. She could try and fly away, but her wings were still _killing_ her from earlier. The pony just continued to stagger forward, opening its jaw, and making increasingly hostile, animalistic noises.

_Crunch._

The pony's head burst open on its right side, seemingly at random. The surprise made Dash jump, and cling to the top of the statue. It staggered around, spewing thick, black sludge. Another sickening _splurch_, and she fell over, and merely twitched. Dash's jaw hung open, and she clung to the statue in terror.

"_Rainbow Dash!_" A voice called. It was familiar - she quickly recognised it as Rarity's. "Get over here, before more of them come!" She looked around frantically for a few moments. "_Up here!_" She blinked, and scanned the rooftops, eventually spotting her on the roof of Sugarcube corner. She had some cloth hanging loosely around her neck, and a cloak draped over her back and flanks. Dash was pretty quick to leap off the statue and make her way over, wheezing and working up a sweat from what would ordinarily be the most trivial of tasks. As she neared her, she was able to pick out a couple of things floating around the unicorn with a soft blue glow; they looked small and sharp. "Quick, get inside!" Dash was in no mood to argue, and headed straight for the open upstairs window. Once inside, Rarity swung around to follow her, and closed the window behind her.

"What... what's..."

"You didn't get bitten, did you?" She asked firmly.

"I... what? No..."

"Good."

"Rarity... what the hay is going on? Why are we in Pinkie's room?"

"Oh yes, that's right, you've been... yes, the accident happened before all this... right." The unicorn shuffled uneasily, stammering a little. "The short answer is, we don't know. It started about three weeks ago - a lot of ponies started getting really sick, and nopony really knew why... it was a very quick illness, they were usually dead within twenty-four hours. But then... then the bodies started moving by themselves... and they were aggressive. That's how the disease spreads. It kills the host, reanimates the body, and spreads by bites. They're not very fast, or smart, but they don't stop until..."

"... until the head comes off. Zombies?" Dash cut in.

"Well, if you _must_ refer to them that way, then yes, 'zombies'." Rarity grimaced. "Most of Ponyville was infected within hours, from what we can tell. There was a small group of us that survived, if only because we had a warning..." she sighed, and started pacing. "Spike broke into my house in the middle of the night, and told me one of Twilight's spells had gone wrong, she was already dead, and that I should find somewhere safe. Naturally, my first instinct was to find Sweetie Belle - she was sleeping over with Applebloom that night. Unfortunately, the disease got to Sweet Apple Acres before we did. Applejack was the only one still alive, hiding on the roof of the barn."

"I... I'm sorry..." Dash kicked her hooves on the floor awkwardly.

"Don't be, there was nothing you could have done." Rarity deadpanned. She wasn't saying it, but Dash could tell by her eyes that the unicorn was still deep in grief. "It was messy, and we lost Spike, but Applejack and I managed to get away safely. We went to check on the others, but... we were too late. And when we went for the hospital, there was just a swarm waiting for us, so we thought we'd lost you too... good to know we were wrong." She produced a half-forced smile. "Then, we just kept moving for a little while, and eventually found somewhere secure with lots of supplies to hole up in until everything blew over, which was... here."

"So... Pinkie... and Fluttershy...?"

"I'm sorry Rainbow, they're... they're gone." Rarity bit her lip. Dash slumped to the ground, her ears drooping. _This just keeps getting better._

"Rarity! What's all this fussin' up here about?" A slightly muffled voice called. Dash pricked her ears and looked to the door. After a few sound thumps, the bedroom door swung open, and Applejack barged in. She was carrying three lassos - one on her hat, and two more hung from something that looked like it was fashioned from Big Macintosh's yoke. She had a similar cape covering her body. Dash now guessed that this was some measure to prevent bites. As soon as she entered, her face lit up. "Well I'll be! Rainbow Dash, _you're alive!_" The earth pony charged over to Dash and scooped her up with her front legs in a firm hug.

"Heheh, good to see you too, AJ..." _Good to know you're not trying to kill me, too._

"Now how in the hay did you get outta there alive? That hospital was crawlin' with them things last time we were there?"

"Hmm, now that I think about it, didn't you have a serious head injury? What happened there..."

"Well..." Dash inhaled deeply. "This is gonna sound pretty crazy..."

* * *

><p>"Rainbow Dash, can you hear me? Hello?" Only soft, scratching noises met Twilight's tired calls. "<em>Dammit...<em>" She thumped her machine, and cut off its power. She needed to save all the energy she could. "She must have jumped again, I can't broadcast that far..."

"I'm sure she's just fine, Twilight Sparkle..." The pair of orange eyes returned to their station opposite the glowing, see-through yellow wall. Its light had been fading steadily for the last few hours, and already Discord was able to move a few insignificant things near the barrier. "The atmosphere is a bit... _dead..._ but she's in good company." He chuckled. Twilight had been ignoring him - all he had been doing was teasing her, and with a procession of spells to maintain and a puzzle to work out, she didn't have the energy to spare on conversation. She was even blocking out 'Commie' Dash's abuse by now. She was weary with hunger and sleep deprivation, but she pressed on with flat out determination. She was going to get Rainbow Dash home if it killed her.


	9. Spark Goes Out

"So... what exactly happened to Twilight? I kinda need to know, since, well, she's my ride home." Dash asked, helping herself to a long drink of water. She wasn't quite sure how long this body was unattended in the hospital, but she was quite thirsty.

"Well that's just it, sugarcube... we don't know." Applejack frowned.

"Then I suggest..." Dash wiped her mouth, and looked out the window to the library. "I suggest we find out."

"You can't be serious, Rainbow!" Rarity chuckled. Dash just glared back at her. "You're... you're serious, aren't you?"

"How crowded is the area around the library?" Dash carried on, ignoring her.

"The whole town's been gettin' quieter for the last coupl'a weeks, so if we keep things on the down low we should be able to get in an' out lickety-split."

"Good. Let's go."

"What, now? Already?" Applejack quirked a brow. "Y'only just got here!"

"Yes, _now._" Dash growled. "Right now, my Twilight is busting her flank just to stay alive, another one is probably heading for the gallows, and _your _Rainbow Dash is lying in a ditch somewhere drooling over herself!" She barked. Applejack and Rarity just returned looks that sat uncomfortably between concern and shock.

"Darling, you... should probably calm down a little..."

"Calm down? How can I keep calm at a time like this!" Dash yelled, and slumped over the window. _Stupid fat brain-damaged me. If she was in shape I'd be out of here in no time._

"Rainbow, pipe down, you'll get their attention!" Applejack whispered harshly.

"Fine..." Dash grumbled. "But I stand by my point. We need to take a look at that place, or I'm stuck here." She looked turned to the other two and patted her belly. She wasn't particularly overweight; there was only a little more fat there than she remembered. Her biggest problem was a month of muscle wasting. "And like this, I'd probably slow you down." Applejack and Rarity exchanged glances, holding a brief, silent conversation.

"Alright. But give us an hour. We need to find you some gear, and let things simmer down out there." Applejack pointed a hoof to the square below. A couple of sick-looking, blood-stained ponies shuffled around the body of the one Rarity had despatched earlier.

"Hm. An hour is fine, I guess."

* * *

><p>"So what's with all this getup?" Dash tilted her head, as Rarity returned to Pinkie's room with a cape, a scarf and a bag full of other odds and ends.<p>

"Protection. If you get snuck up on from behind, they'll bite the cape and not you." Applejack explained, while Rarity went about the business of dressing Rainbow Dash up. "Ya put the scarf over yer mouth when yer outside. As y'might expect, it gets mighty messy out there, and ya don't wanna accidentally swallow some blood."

"How do you guys know all this?" Dash quirked a brow. Applejack sighed and gazed wistfully at the floor for a moment before answering.

"... trail an' error. There used to be four of us."

"Oh..." Dash grimaced, and decided not to press this line of inquiry further.

"Well, I think we're all set, shall we move?" Rarity added, briskly moving the conversation along.

"Wait a sec..." Dash spotted something out of the corner of her eye. Two somewhat familiar shapes at the bottom of the bag, laid out on a table. She upended the bag, and let out a little gasp. Two cuffs bounced out of the bag, and attached to each one, in a protective hempen sheath, was something that looked like a long blade. _You're kidding me!_ "... where did you get these?"

"The hoofblades? We found 'em when we were scavengin' some place for supplies. We didn't know anypony who could use 'em, but we figured we might as well hold on to 'em, just in case. Why, is there somethin' you ain't told us?" Applejack chuckled. She was smiling, but her eyes betrayed the hollowness of the expression.

"You could put it that way..."

* * *

><p>Rather than causing a fuss, any 'zombies' they found, as Dash called them (Applejack preferred the term 'walkers', while Rarity just referred to them as 'them' or 'those things'), they skirted around discreetly. Unfit as she may have been, Dash still had a pretty light step, so this wasn't hard. The door to the library was ajar, and inside was a total mess. It looked like nopony had been in here for weeks, or at least nopony living - books lay scattered on the ground, many of them torn or chewed on.<p>

They made sure to check all the exits first thing. While the library would be a very sturdy hideout, they certainly didn't want to get trapped in here. The basement hatch was left open, and a few claw marks were left in the wood around it, where Spike had scrambled out in a hurry. The acrid odour of rotting flesh wafted from the opening. Seeing nothing of value up top, they cautiously and reluctantly made their way downstairs.

Rarity provided a light as they descended. She held a pair of knives in the air, at the ready for anything they might encounter. The longer they stood there, overlooking Twilight's basement laboratory, the less worried they became about a threat, the brighter Rarity could make the light, and the more they could see of the devastated scene below.

The basement was a mess of overturned machines, cabinets of bottles, some intact and containing various coloured liquids, but many of them broken or knocked over, with just sludges and residues remaining. A small pile of scrolls was scattered on one of the few overturned desks, only loosely rolled up - no wax seals, no royal emblems. Something was hanging by a rope from the ceiling, shading out a few things at the back of the room, but they had trouble picking out the finer details. Whatever it was, the smell seemed to be coming from it. Rarity hesitated, and gave the hanging object a telekinetic nudge. Gently, it swung back and forth, rotating through a small angle, but enough to bring some key details into the light, and put all of their jaws on the floor.

Dangling from the bottom were two legs terminating in hooves, and further up the body were two more. A pony. Near the rope were the remains of their face, the nose and mouth rotted away to nothing, leaving just bare bone. The head sat at an unnatural angle, and the body appeared to be hanging by their neck from a rope. A pony that had taken their own life. Further down was a symbol emblazoned on their flank - a six-pointed star in magenta, surrounded by smaller white and lilac ones. A pony they knew.

"I... I knew Twilight was dead, but... not like _this!_" Rarity gibbered. Dash gulped, and started down the steps to the lower level.

"Keep it together sugarcube..." Applejack grimaced, placing a hoof on Rarity's shoulder, and after a moment they followed.

Carefully, quite wary of potential hazards around the room, Dash picked through the remains of the lab. There were all sorts of junk with some arcane function - their date could be told not by the content of the labels, but the neatness of the writing. Books, mechanical equipment and arcanoelectronics abounds, but little sign of the flight suit. _It's gotta be around here somewhere... _

Rarity turned her attention to the pile of scrolls. She opened one of them - it looked like the oldest. It appeared to be blank, before an image flickered into life on the page, depicting a very worn out and dishevelled Twilight leaning over something to look out of the page. She shied away in surprise - the image was... moving? Most odd. Probably some experimental thing of Twilight's.

_"Is this thing on?_" The scroll announced in Twilight's voice. Applejack and Rainbow Dash looked up from their searches, and came over to inspect this curiosity. "_Okay, it's on. This is... yeah. September 17th, 1001. I'm starting this diary separate from my letters to the Princess, for some top secret work. There's... there's something really weird going on. I can't really put it any better than that right now, but something visited me in the night, something I've never seen before... and I know it wasn't a dream, because Spike saw it too! Hmm... further study is needed._" The picture disappeared, and the scroll rolled itself up. _Huh. September. Three guesses._

Rarity took another scroll and opened it, and another talking picture appeared. "_November 4th, 1001. This... thing... it... it transcends realities! It crosses universes! Infinite variations of the spacetime manifold and uncertainty permutations..._" Twilight's incoherent babble trailed off, and the image appeared to walk around the room, ranting. But pretty quickly, she returned, her face up close to whatever was capturing this image. Her bloodshot eyes had heavy bags under them. "_The multiverse is this monster's plaything... whether it's just a series of copies, or part of the multiverse's superstructure, I don't know... further study is needed._" The message sent a chill up Dash's spine. What if there just simply wasn't a way to defeat Discord? What if he was just a fact of life, that the Princesses had done their best to shield them all from? Rarity opened another. "_February 12th, 1002. I can see... forever! Eehehehah! AAHhahahah!_" Dash blinked. The image of Twilight just cackled vacantly for several minutes, before switching off the recording.

"Well, that was... interesting..." Rarity quirked a brow, and took another one.

"_January 14th, 1002._" _Well, so much for being organised._ "_The beast's name is Discord._" _Called it._ "_After months of testing, I'm narrowing it down to a few solutions that might take care of him, but none of them are easy, because something about Discord is bound to interdimensional space, which allows him to jump between universes at will. The first solution is a specially prepared virus that, once it infects him, should seep into his interdimensional components and destroy them. Then we only have to deal with one Discord at a time. I don't know if this will work, because the arcane components of the virus aren't replicating... Celestia knows what kind of damage this thing could do if it infected a normal pony._" _Good job, Twi._ "_The second, from what I know about Discord, will definitely work if attempted, but attempting it is the problem. It's been speculated that in order to jump universes, a pony has to reach the speed of light, and issue a particular spell at the right moment. This causes anything of high electrical density to switch with its homologue, or if no homologue exists, actually transfer matter to the next universe. Discord, however, has an entirely separate mechanism, more like a bridge through interdimensional space that he can cross at any time. If my calculations are correct, then if Discord were to perform a conventional jump, it would cause a paradox, erasing his interdimensional bridge, and every trace of his existence from every universe it's connected to. It's a bit crude, but it just might work. The problem is actually getting him to do it... further study is needed._"

"Did you get any o' that?" Applejack blinked. Rarity shrugged. Dash, however, was deep in thought. She didn't understand everything that had been thrown at her - but she'd caught a few key words. _Discord, conventional jump, erase, every trace of his existence. That ought to do it._ She mused over some of the things she'd seen - the atrocities, the brutal divisions between her friends, Scootaloo's mutilation, a pony dying at her hooves... it all had to go. _But how..._

"One more?" Rarity offered, holding up another scroll.

"Alright... we can look through the rest later." Applejack nodded. Rarity opened it out, and the message began to play. This time, Twilight was much more visibly distraught. "_Feb... February 28th, 1002. The virus got out. Cheerilee... Cheerilee was here, helping me move some things around, when it spilled on her. She accidentally swallowed some, and..._" She sniffed, and paused for a moment, apparently trying to resist bursting into tears. "_She was dead in minutes. But that wasn't the end of it... after a couple of minutes the body started moving by itself... it was clearly the virus reanimating the corpse, but she turned aggressive, and... well, this happened._" She held up a hoof, showing off a weeping bite-mark. "_I was able to shut her out of the basement just now, but the damage was already done. I'm infected._" She sniffed deeply, and wiped her face. "_I'm leaving all my logs out so you know what's happened these past few months, and somepony can carry on my work, it's... it's important. There's a flight suit in the blue chest that's charged for one flight." _Dash perked up her ears. "_If you look through my other logs, you'll know how to use it. It was originally built for Rainbow Dash, but I don't know if she'll ever walk again, let alone fly. As for me, well... when you find me I'll have taken care of myself._" Twilight levitated a noose into view. "_If I don't, then somepony else will have to." _She started to tear up. "_Guys... Applejack, Fluttershy, Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Pinkie Pie... if any of you ever find this... I just want you know I love you all, and you're the best friends anypony could ever ask for... I'm sending Spike to warn you about what's coming._ _I don't know if he'll make it past Cheerilee, but Celestia knows he'll go through hell or high water for Rarity, so I'm hopeful._" Rarity sniffled, and leaned against Applejack, a tear rolling down her face. "_Well... that's it then. Your friend to the end... Twilight Sparkle._" The image disappeared, and Rarity buried her face in Applejack's shoulder, sobbing lightly. Applejack and Dash looked at her, and then each other, sharing a concerned frown.

Dash shook her head, and returned to searching the debris.

"Rainbow, what are you doing?" Applejack queried.

"Looking for the... _aha!_ The chest." Dash nosed the lid open, and lo and behold, the suit was folded neatly on top of the other contents, with a couple of extra mechanical doodads sitting on top.

"Well shucks... yer tall tale ain't so tall after all."

* * *

><p>Dash spent the rest of the afternoon and evening tirelessly going over Twilight's messages, learning as much as she could about Discord and the flight suit. It seemed that the salient points were covered in the few they had seen earlier - Twilight's often incoherent recordings went into far more detail than she needed. She did, however, work out how to correctly configure the suit, even down to predicting her destination with reasonable certainty. Though through all of her preparations, she knew there was one thing that she was missing. Every so often she'd take a break, and fly over the town to stretch her wings - it wasn't like her to be cooped up and <em>studying<em>. But each trip out reminded her of her problem. Every time she landed back on the roof of Sugarcube corner, panting and sweating, the doubt resurfaced. _I can't fly fast enough._

Thumping on the door woke her up. She'd fallen asleep at a desk, the flight suit lying spread out, ready to go.

"Y'alright there sugarcube? You ain't said a thing all evenin'!"

"Wh... whuh?" Dash lifted her head up and looked around. _Oh. Just Applejack._ "Y... yeah..." She mumbled. The door opened, and the earth pony entered.

"Now come on, ah can tell somethin's buggin' ya." _And I can tell something's bugging you... but it wouldn't help to bring that up. Applebloom's gone._

"I... I..._ gah_, this is embarassing. I don't think I can get up to speed for the jump." Her cheeks burned, and she whimpered softly at the admission. Applejack pouted, and leaned against the doorframe.

"Now that is a doozy..."

"Unless..." An idea struck Dash. _It's reckless, but it'll probably work..._ "I think I know a way. But it's definitely a one way trip." Applejack cast a doubtful look down her nose at the pegasus.

"Go on."

"I go to the hospital, and loot anything that'll get me buzzed. Adrenaline, painkillers, steroids, anything to numb the muscle ache and keep me going." Dash held a serious face, while Applejack frowned. "All it has to do is get me flying fast enough to make the jump, which only takes a few minutes. Though when I say a one way trip... it probably means going over the lethal dose for a lot of these things. You'll have your Rainbow Dash back, but she might be dead by the time she hits the ground."

"So... what part of this plan didja think ah was gonna be okay with?" Applejack snarled. "What makes ya think you have the right to take another pony's life just to get home?"

"See... that's not the only thing." Dash continued solemnly. "Your Rainbow is already gone. I saw the reports in the hospital. Nurse Redheart killed herself and left her for dead, saying she was too messed up in the head to know what was going on. Like I said, right now she's probably sitting in a ditch drooling on herself." Applejack just glared.

"An' you ain't even gonna give her a chance?"

"Alright. Let's say I wait a few weeks, and train up the old fashioned way. She'd be dead by the time I make the jump. She can't even walk, so how do you expect her to find food and water? I'd give her two days. And this is assuming she hasn't landed on her head or something." The pair stared at each other in silence for a few tense minutes. Eventually Applejack sighed, and backed down.

"Ah guess you're right..."

"I'm sorry it has to be this way, I really am. But time's running out."


	10. One Way Ticket To Hell And Back

_Crash._

Rainbow Dash smashed open a top floor window of the hospital with a hoof, and carefully maneuvered herself inside. She didn't care that it was dark, with _them _hiding potentially around every corner, or that she might cut her leg up pretty bad on the broken glass, or about the noise. She was even going to flippantly disregard a bite - as long as she stayed alive long enough to get up to speed, she'd be happy.

It still hurt though. A shard had sliced along the outside of her leg, and while the bleeding was slow, it stung terribly. She winced, and pushed past the pain to take up her search. She jogged through the upper corridors until she found a staircase. She whizzed past the remains of Nurse Redheart again - they hadn't moved an inch since she was last here. The utter silence and near-total darkness didn't do much for her nerves. By the staircase, there was a list of departments, accompanied by arrows for direction. _Let's see... Maternity ward, no... urology.. what the hay even is that? Hmm... ENT, neurology pulariatrics... okay, ground floor. Operating theatres, A&E... aha! Anaesthetics and pharmacy. That should be it..._

As the note had said, the stairs were nigh-on impassable. Cabinets full of medical equipment were tossed haphazardly into the stairwell, and there were a couple of gaps big enough to see through, there weren't any she could worm her way through. _Dammit Redheart, there's no way I'm gonna be able to lift these... _She looked around for ideas. Her eyes settled on a fire extinguisher, and a wry smile crept across her face.

A couple of minutes later, she returned with every fire extinguisher, oxygen tank and propane tank she could find on the top floor. She hastily stuffed them together in every gap she could see in the blockage, wedging them between cabinets and shoving them into the peep-holes. Eventually, she was left with just the original fire extinguisher. She looked at the veritable barrage of tanks, most of them oxygen tanks, and then back at the fire extinguisher. _Better hold on to this one._

Another few minutes later, she returned with a heavy rack, laden with machines of various functions. She'd deliberately removed some of the load from the bottom, making it top-heavy. With a bit of a run up, she set the rack in motion, barrelling down the corridor like a freight train. The doors swung open with ease, and as planned, the rack swung over the banister of the stairwell and on to the blockage with a mighty _crash_. She ducked and covered her head.

_Wait for it..._

_... any second now..._

_... dammit._ She waited a good half a minute, before picking herself up and cautiously peering into the stairwell. She could hear a hissing noise, and there was definitely a smell of propane in the air. Her frustration quickly gave way to panic when she heard some sparking. _Was one of those machines electrical... I don't..._ The hissing got slightly louder. _Time to go!_

She immediately banked round and leaped through the double doors, and took to rapid flight down the corridor.

_Boom._

Behind her, the stairwell erupted in flames, blowing the doors clean off and sending them bouncing down the hallway. She ducked around a corner to let them fly past, and a wave of hot air rushed behind her. Considering herself a safe distance away, she stopped and looked back.

_Boom._

Another blast rocked the building, air flooding into the stairwell from broken windows and the downstairs corridor to fill the vaccuum left by the hot gasses, igniting a backdraft. Dash was knocked to the floor, but mostly from shock. Stunned but uninjured, she peered around the corner at the charred remains of the stairwell. Burst, blackened tanks lay all over the place, and when she looked inside, most of the blockage had been cleared - the racks and shelves were pushed several yards away, and while she'd still have to climb over a few of them, the way was passable.

The ground floor was a mess. Shattered glass littered the ground, along with the occasional gorey remains of a pony. She guessed that it was only a matter of time before she came face to face with...

_Thump._

Too late. A single undead pony, hobbling along on three legs, its jaw missing, butted against the window. She could see another few in the distance at the edge of the hospital grounds. _Dammit! The explosion must have caught their attention. Better move it._

The anaesthetics department wasn't so much a department as it was a single room, with wall-to-wall cabinets chock full of bottles and vials. A window from the corridor to the room let her see inside. The door was locked, and even with a few firm bucks it seemed to be staying that way. She looked around for a solution, and another fire extinguisher caught her gaze.

_Crash._

Rather than going to all the trouble of rigging the door to explode, she went for the more direct approach of breaking down the internal window. She gave herself another scratch while hopping through the broken window, but with natural adrenaline already pumping through her veins, she didn't notice. _Painkillers, check... let's pop a few of these... blech! That tastes nasty. What else we got... sedative? That's the _last_ thing I need right now... adrenaline! Now, careful... careful... no wonder doctors are usually unicorns, filling syringes with your teeth is hard! Then just... OW, ow ow... that's not how you do that, let's try that again... prick... there! Gah, that's gonna leave a mark..._

Dash absorbed herself in going through the various drugs cabinets, becoming increasingly jittery as minutes passed. Another _thud_ caught her attention, and she dropped a bottle of gepefrine. Another few of the groaning, walking bodies, in various states of bodily decay, were crowding the window. One of them fell over side ways with a sickening _crack_, while the others just craned their necks inside, or batted a hoof limply across the broken glass. _I'm out of time._

To test her painkillers, she thumped a hoof firmly against the corner of a desk. It just tickled mildly - perfect. She gave the suit's apparatus a whack, and it hummed into life. She smirked, hunkered down, and charged for the door.

_Crash._

With a four-hoofed assault on the door, it flew clean off its hinges, knocking two ponies to the floor and crushing a third against the wall. Dash immediately kicked off the door and made for one of the outside windows. At the last moment, a rotting pink face popped up from below, into Dash's path out of the window. Already in motion, she collided with the pony, and tumbled to the floor outside.

It wasn't even stunned by the impact, putting Dash at an instant disadvantage. She could just about prop two hooves up against the pony's collar to keep its dripping, jagged jaws away from her. From a distance, these once-living ponies could potentially pass for normal, assuming they weren't missing a leg or had a rotted flank, but up close they were just plain horrifying. The eyes and nose had just rotted away to nothing, and its teeth were crooked and broken, with blood congealed all around its face. The only relatively intact thing about this one was its poofy pink mane. _Wait... poofy pink mane?_

"P... _Pinkie?_" Dash's jaw hung slack. The earth pony just continued its mindless assault as if she hadn't said anything. "Pinkie, I..."

In a moment of distraction, Dash let go. The remains of Pinkie Pie lowered on to her, jaws opening out sink their teeth in. By the time Dash realised what was happening, she couldn't get out of the way, only roll to the side in damage control. With the cocktail of drugs coursing through her body, she didn't feel a thing, but she could hear the result.

_Crunch._

At about the same time, Pinkie placed a full-force bite on Dash's right shoulder, and Dash used the same arm to thump her attacker away. With the suit, the blow knocked Pinkie clean off her feet, and a _crack_ told her that some serious internal damage was done too. But in coming away, two small chunks of flesh were ripped from Dash's shoulder. All she could feel was a dull sting, but she could tell from the fresh crimson on Pinkie's face that the damage was done.

_Dead within minutes... alright, let's do this._ Without a second thought, she took to the sky.

The painkillers and stimulants were working a dream. Although she was light-headed and rapidly becoming surly, it felt almost like her regular flight. The only thing that threw it off was the bite on her shoulder, which stung more and more as time went by. As soon as she passed the sound barrier, she was already feeling slightly nauseous. The light-headed feeling only intensified, and before long she could barely even tell where she was going. By the time light intensity around her was starting to shift, the only thought in her head was a simple wish:

_I hope that virus isn't in my brain._

* * *

><p>Dash sat up sharply. An owl perched on a nearby branch flew away. She was in the canopy of a few trees, saliva encrusted on her face, and she could still feel the mild constriction of the flight suit and its goggles. Her head was still swimming in some of the leftover drugs that had carried over, and while it wasn't nearly as bad as a few seconds ago, she was still pretty dizzy. That said, the sudden transition from a highly altered mental state to near sobriety was a jarring feeling in itself.<p>

The first thing to hit her as soon as she came to her senses was an intense hunger and thirst. _Called it._ _Totally called it._ She rolled off the tree canopy fell straight into a glide, beating her wings with renewed ease. With a sigh of relief, she fluttered up to the cloud layer to get an idea of her position.

She could just about make out some mountains on the horizon, lit up by the last vestiges of sunset. Judging by the direction of the shadows, they were to the north. They had a somewhat familiar shape to them, but what struck her the most was that they were alarmingly far away. This place certainly looked like the Everfree Forest, but she didn't know it went on this far. She sighed, and started flying.

* * *

><p>It was nearly sunrise by the time she reached familiar territory. She'd made a couple of stops along the way for food, water and the occasional catnap on a cloud when the wind was favourable. On her approach to Ponyville, she kept herself hidden in a cloud, making sure to hold on to it this time - no harsh wind was going to blow this one away. Under her cover, she could lower herself over the town square, where she could see a small gathering of ponies at a wooden stage. As she got closer, she could start making out more details: there were five ponies on the stage, two of them standing under a scaffold, with... what looked like bags on their heads?<p>

She was now close enough to make out the faces of the other ponies. Applejack, face hidden under her hat, Rarity, looking fabulous as always, and Pinkie Pie, bouncing around like she hadn't a care in the world. She looked back at the other two, and recognised the colours - soft lilac and bright cream. She could also pick out a rope strung around the necks of each. She gasped, and drifted in closer, enough to hear voices.

"Nearly dawn, Applejack."

"Alright, let's get this show on the road! Heheh... any last requests?"

"_Bite me._" Twilight grunted.

"Okie dokie lokie!"

"_Ow!_ I didn't mean that literally, Pinkie!" _Oh, we are _not_ doing this again._ Dash took another moment to position her cloud just right. The sun broke over the horizon, and Applejack reached for a lever on the stage.

_Crunch._

Dash lunged from the cloud, both hind hooves outstretched. They first connected with Applejack's head, and proceeded to the floor, putting her face through the floorboards. The earth pony yelped in pain, but quickly went limp.

"Ohey, it's Dashie! Do you want me to bite you too?" Pinkie Pie beamed. _Funny that._ Dash pushed past her, casually knocking her off the stage, and lunged straight for Rarity. Before she had time to react, Dash's forehoof connected with the unicorn's temple, knocking her out cold and flinging her from the stage. An aside glance to the crowd showed her guards scrambling towards the stage.

"_Time to go!_" Dash leaped to the scaffold, and with a well-placed kick, shattered the beam holding up the two nooses. She whipped the bags off their heads, revealing a disgruntled looking Twilight with an odd, metallic device hooked on to her horn, and a terrified Fluttershy, tears streaming down her face.

"_Rainbow Dash!_" Twilight gasped. "Get this thing off my horn, I'll get us out of here!"

"Uhm..." Dash blinked. She leaned over to the horn, and tapped it. It was like a black, steel ring with some jewels embedded in it. There didn't seem to be any kind of clip that she could detach, but maybe if she just... lifted it...

_Fswsh._ As soon as it was out of contact of the horn, Twilight grabbed the two pegasi and winked out.

When they reappeared, they were somewhere in the Everfree forest, in a clearing.

"What was that thing? The thing on your horn?" Dash panted, finally getting a moments' break.

"It's a neuroarcane neutraliser." Twilight replied casually. Dash's blank stare prompted a simpler explanation. "... a thing that stops a unicorn from using magic."

"Ohhh... alright, so you can give this thing another blast then?" Dash tapped the console on her suit. Twilight's cautious relief drained away, and she snapped back harshly,

"Oh! You're _that_ Rainbow Dash! Is this so you can _abandon_ us again? Is that it?"

"I came back!" Dash yelled. After spending all night in the air, her patience was as frayed as Twilight's.

"If you were even a minute later, we'd be _dead!_"

"And if I didn't 'abandon' you, I'd be on those gallows _with _you!"

"Guys..." Fluttershy interrupted, her voice barely above a whisper, and only audible by virtue of timing.

"_What?_" Twilight and Dash barked in unison.

"Please... stop fighting..." The pegasus whimpered, curled up on the ground next to them, her eyes still watering. Reluctantly, they looked back to each other, and continued their exchange in a more civil tone.

"Just tell me this, Rainbow. Why _should_ I help you get home?" Twilight growled.

"Because if you don't, you don't get your Rainbow Dash back." Dash replied in tone. Twilight paused, giving her an icy stare, before eventually bowing her head to the box and giving it a zap.

"Fine. But be quick." Twilight snarled. Dash just nodded, and took off.

"Where... where's Rainbow Dash going?" Fluttershy asked, as they watched Dash accelerate into the distance.

_Boom._

"It's... a long story."

* * *

><p><em>Crunch.<em>

As Dash approached Twilight's cave, a guardspony, decked out in khaki uniform, tumbled backwards from the cavemouth, a bloody mark on his head. She cautiously stepped forward, and a rock, surrounded by a soft lilac glow and covered in scarlet splatters, shot forward to meet her. She ducked, and the rock narrowly missed.

"Hey! Ease up Twilight, it's me!"

"Rainbow Dash?" The unicorn jumped out of cover to meet her. "You're alright!"

"Sort of. Four jumps in three days and twelve hours of straight flying really take it out of you."

"Come in, rest up..."

"I... can't."

"What?" Twilight gasped. "Why not?"

"Long story short, we were right. Discord's behind it all. _But_, I think I know a way to beat him and set everything right. I just need to get home as soon as possible."

"Oh..." The unicorn looked a little disappointed. "I was kinda hoping you could help me with something..."

"What?" Dash tilted her head quizically.

"Ever since you left, I've started seeing guards more often, and sometimes even finding my hideout, as you..." Twilight levitated the guard's body away from the cave mouth, and with a little windup, fired it into the air. Dash watched it career away into the distance with a wince. "... might have noticed." After a few seconds, a quiet, echoing _thump_ heralded the body's landing. "They must have followed your trail here."

"Oh..."

"Don't worry about it, I'm just as stupid for not thinking of it. So anyway, while I could keep skulling them with rocks and punting them away, it'd probably be better if I just found a new cave."

"Well... actually, if what I learned from another Twilight is right... if what I'm trying to do works, then it should cause a para... paradox! Cause a paradox, and completely erase Discord from every..."

"A paradox?" Twilight went wide-eyed. "_Of course!_ If Discord is a multidimensional being, then a paradox that removes him from existence would remove him from _every_ instance of Equestria, and all the harm he did anywhere would be undone!"

"Right!"

"In that case, we need to get you moving, missy!" Twilight promptly kneeled down, and gave the suit a shot of magical energy. The suit hummed into life, and Dash staggered a little.

"Not even a cup of hot cocoa?" Dash bleated.

"There isn't a second to lose, _go!_" Twilight was positively bouncing with excitement as she pushed Dash back out into the snow. Eventually, Dash conceded defeat, and reared up to take off. "Celestia speed, Rainbow." Twilight grinned. Dash just nodded and saluted, and was off.


	11. Race Against The Machine

Rainbow Dash lurched forward breathlessly. No matter how many times she went through it, she still wasn't getting used to the jump. However, she was fairly confident this would be the last time. She shook her head and looked around. She was lying on the floor in Twilight's basement, with some lightly glowing blue ropes around her, holding her in place. Underneath the ropes, she could feel the harder components of the suit digging into her. There was also a funny smell that she didn't want to think about. She wriggled a little, but the ropes weren't budging. _Hah, on any other day..._ A yellow haze covered the door, and some beeping, flashing machines lined the walls. Twilight was limping around the room, going from machine to machine, making adjustments.

"_Twilight!_" Dash yelped. Her voice was hoarse - she guessed there wasn't much to drink down here, and hadn't been for a few days. The unicorn looked over in a lazy fashion. "Twilight, it's me!"

"Rainbow?" Twilight slurred. Her eyes were bloodshot, and her breath was uneasy.

"Get me out of this thing, I've got a plan to beat Discord!" Dash blurted, struggling some more, but just turning herself onto her side.

"How... how do I know it's you? That it's not some trick?" Twilight grunted. Rainbow Dash could tell she was running on pure determination alone by now.

"Uhm..." Dash bit her lip, and tried to think back, looking for some kind of identifying cue. _Gah, sure is hard to think with these... these enchanted ropes..._ Her mind wandered, and she couldn't help but blush a little. And just to make sure she couldn't hide her feelings from Twilight, her wings started stiffening, one of them slipping out of the ropes. Twilight blinked and raised both eyebrows.

"_Eeyep, _definitely you." She gulped, and in a flash, the ropes disappeared. Dash immediately wriggled free, and rushed over to hug Twilight. She could feel how weak the unicorn was, and hear it in her wavering voice. "_Ngh!_ So... what's your plan?"

"There's no time to explain, just charge me!"

"What?"

"Trust me, I know what I'm doing!"

"I..." The unicorn panted. "... alright." She closed her eyes, leaned down to the box and wound up the spell. It took much longer than it had before, and the casting even seemed to be causing her pain. When she was done, her legs went limp, and she collapsed to the floor. The yellow membrane over the door disappeared.

"_Twilight!_" Dash dropped to her and put an ear to her chest. Her breathing and heartbeat were weak, but present. "Alright Twi... don't you worry. I'll get 'em." She whispered. She didn't know if her words were heard, but she didn't have time to make sure. She steeled herself, and headed outside.

* * *

><p>Outside, the scene was of abject chaos, as bad as, if not worse than last time. Buildings sailed through the air, hapless ponies clinging onto whatever they could for dear life, and diving for the ground when every so often, the edifice would spontaneously divide into a number of pieces, or collide with another. Every so often, a tree or a bench might explode in multicoloured flames and then completely reverse, sending ponies scampering away for safety - provided they weren't blithely tapdancing along a lamppost in total defiance of gravity, or carving chunks of earth into perfect cubes and stacking them into blocky structures.<p>

Dash kept her cool, calmly trotting down the road from the library, ignoring the mayhem around her. There was a faint pounding sensation inside her head that she couldn't quite put her hoof on, but she put it down to dehydration. She made her way to the main square, where the town hall was spinning on the point of its roof like a top. A cloud-mounted chariot was positioned above it, drawn by two ponies she could just about make out to be Princesses Celestia and Luna, and in the seat was a figure all too familiar.

"_Discord!_" Dash announced. After a moment's pause, she heard a _crack_, and the chariot surged into life, taking a spiral path to the ground. When it stopped a few lengths in front of her, the Princesses reared back, and made some unnatural whinnying noises. A throne was mounted on the chariot, with Discord sprawled over it, and Pinkie Pie happily chewing on the peak.

"Well, well! Had a fun trip? I hope you wrote postcards!" The draconequus jeered. Dash's expression remained dour. "Oh, it was one of _those_ trips then!"

"I've got a proposition for you. You like games. I've got one for you."

"Ooh! Ooh! I _love_ games!" Pinkie squealed, bouncing on to the tip of the throne. Discord just smirked, and slouched more.

"A wager? Do go on."

"A race around the world. I win, you turn everything back to normal. You win, and... well, I'll just back off. It should take, what..." She tapped the apparatus, and executed a deft flip. "... five minutes?" Discord just broke down in a fit of mad cackling. Before long Pinkie joined the chorus, even though she probably didn't get it.

"_You_ want to race..." Discord clicked his fingers, and his wings were replaced with jet engines. "..._me?_"

"Two rules. No teleporting, and no clicky-chaos-thing." Dash continued, deadpan. Discord continued to snicker.

"Y'know what? This is just too funny. You're on!" He chuckled, and summoned a start line from nowhere. "Three-two-one-_go!_" He spat out quickly, and leaving a cloud of smoke and dust behind him, he tore away into the distance. Dash just smirked, and shot after him.

The gap shrank rapidly - the suit definitely pulled its weight - but Discord made sure it never closed. The headache Dash was nursing wasn't going away, and she was now experiencing some light-headedness to boot, but she certainly wasn't going to give in. As their speed increased, they rose away from the ground, into the thinner air. From up here, Dash could see the full extent of the carnage below - every part of Equestria that she could see was experiencing similar disruption. Mountains swaying in the wind, whole forests turned upside down, rivers flowing backwards... She shook her head and brought her focus back to the race. The draconequus was doing acrobatic loops and twirls, and _still_ getting away. All Dash was getting was nauseous, and she wasn't sure why.

_Boom._ Ahead of her, a colourless shockwave spread out from Discord's slender, winding form. Dash braced herself to plough through it. The headache was getting worse, and the sunlight wasn't helping.

_Boom._ Behind her, a radiant disc of colours erupted from the air around her, as only seconds later, she broke the sound barrier aswell. The ground below whizzed past, blurring more with each passing second.

"_Agh!_" A sudden, sharp sting in the back of her neck distracted her for a moment, and the gap between them grew slightly. However, she was quick to correct this discrepancy, and they continued to accelerate. She quickly threw a hoof to the back of her neck and felt around - nothing seemed unusual, though the pain persisted. She figured it must be internal.

_Oh no._

Pieces started falling into place. Headaches, light-headedness, nausea, and now a sharp pain in her brain stem. She almost dropped straight out of the sky with the shock; she was still infected. The symptoms were identical to when she jumped after getting the bite, save for a lack of painkillers, and a different site of sharp, burning pain - the centre of infection.

_Dead within minutes..._ Her wings kept beating away on autopilot, and the gap to Discord kept growing. He was flying on his back, pulling faces and doing the occasional trick. _Five minutes._ She narrowed her gaze. _Alright, let's do this._

She could already see her peripheral vision darkening. Whether this was from her final approach to the light barrier, or her slipping from consciousness, she couldn't tell. Regardless, the important fact remained - Discord was still ahead.

One by one, she could feel her organs failing, her extremities dying. She quickly lost feeling in all four legs, and her front legs were pinned to her sides limply. Her wings would have started to give out, but for the sheer level of willpower she was mustering to keep them going. Her heart pounded like a drum-roll, and her thoracic muscles were working at full tilt to keep her breathing. It felt as though she'd drop dead the instant she took her mind off of flying, even to take stock of the fact that Discord was still ahead.

She closed her eyes. They were essentially useless at this stage - all it did was burn. Her capacity for higher thought was dulling by the second, and before long, the only thought in her head was the urge, the duty to fly like she'd never flown before.

Everything went white.

* * *

><p><em>'Hey Scoot, how you doing today?'<em> Dash asked. The little pegasus filly was sprawled out on a hospital bed. _'Better.'_ Scootaloo replied with a brave face. Dash just smiled and ruffled her mane. Scootaloo's wings were growing back, and healing well. Nurse Redheart passed the bed, and Dash struck up a conversation. _'You're doing well, Nurse! What was it like being dead?' 'It was cold, and hot. And pointy.' 'Hm. Interesting. Would you recommend it?' 'Hey Rainbow!'_ Scootaloo interrupted. _'Wake up!'_ _'What?' 'Wake up!'_

"Whu... what are you talking about, Scoot..."

"Rainbow Dash, _wake up!_"

"_Aah!_" Dash jumped in shock. The hospital bed was gone, and so were Scootaloo and Nurse Redheart. Instead, Twilight Sparkle was standing over her with an alarmed expression. "Twilight?" She bleated, scooching out from under her and looking around. They were on the upper level of the library. Outside they could see a bright spring day, and the Cutie Mark Crusaders playing in the park across the road. "Where... what? Did I jump again?"

"I don't know, the last thing I remember was being in the basement, and Discord was outside, then I passed out and woke up in here..."

"Wait..." Dash put a hoof to her chin. "... if you remember that, that means you're my Twilight..." She got up, and began to pace. "... so either we jumped together, or I didn't jump at all..."

"The second one is much more likely." Twilight added. "But then... what happened to Discord?"

"Well, the last thing _I_ remember is racing Discord to trick him into doing a normal jump, which should have caused a paradox or something..."

"That... that might have worked!" The unicorn started to bounce with glee. "We just need to check a few things... _Spike!_"

"_Ah!_ No need to shout..." He rubbed his eyes and crawled from his basket behind them.

"Oh, sorry... Spike, what day is it?"

"Uhm..." The dragon quirked a brow, and went over to a desk to fetch a calendar. Twilight slapped her forehead, lamenting her own ignorance. "Wednesday, April 17th, why?"

"Huh... that's the day of the first test..."

"Spike, what happened to Discord?" Dash cut in.

"Discord?" He blinked and tilted his head. "Who's Discord?" Dash and Twilight exchanged a little smile.

"Never mind. C'mon Rainbow, we've got some things to check out."

* * *

><p>One by one, the two ponies quizzed each of their friends about Discord, only to be presented with the same answer - as far as they were concerned, he never existed. However, they were as baffled as they were relieved - why, they wondered, were the only ponies to remember Discord? They found a spot alone at the edge of the forest to contemplate this mystery. No sense trying to bring others into the discussion, they reasoned. All that would do is cause alarm about a phantom threat. For about an hour, they went over their information again and again, but only ever drew up blanks. They were about to give up, when the sound of a pegasus landing nearby caught their attention.<p>

Twilight just looked up in mild alarm, while Rainbow Dash, scrambled off her back and into the air. The intruder was close - only about five lengths away.

"Are you two Twilight Sparkle and Rainbow Dash?" She asked. Dash's jaw hit the floor. She recognised the voice, and as she kept looking, the shape and colour.

"What the... _Spitfire?_" She boggled.

"That's a yes, then." The flame-haired pegasus chuckled. "I have to ask you both to come with me."

"What?" Twilight tilted her head. "Why?" Spitfire just lowered her head and smiled knowingly.

"It's about Discord." Both Rainbow and Twilight gawped incredulously. "I suppose an explanation is in order?" She asked. The two of them nodded slowly. "Walk with me." She turned and waved a hoof, motioning them to follow her. They promptly did so. "As you might know, when a paradox occurs, any universes it occurs in are completely reset, and play back again, taking the fewest number of steps to avoid the paradox. But what you might not know is that when a mind breaches the interuniversal medium, it infers a sort of... resistance to paradox resets. We're not quite sure how it works, but it's a hot research field."

"So..." Twilight screwed up her face, processing this information. "... because Rainbow was jumping between universes, and I made contact with her from here... mentally, we were unaffected by the paradox reset?"

"Exactly."

"That means... you've jumped before?"

"How do you know all this anyway?" Dash interrupted, swooping around in front of Spitfire.

"Well, one question kinda answers the other." Spitfire smiled. "But to be more specific, I guess you could say that the Wonderbolts are a bit more than stunt fliers. A select few of us work closely with some of the top minds in Canterlot University's arcanophysics department, under personal supervision of Princess Celestia. We've been watching the whole thing, and we like how you handled it."

"So, what are you saying?"

"We want to offer both of you a job."

_Fin_

* * *

><p>AN: Finally got this thing out of my hair! If you enjoyed this story, great. If not, I don't blame you, because I did kind of rush the last few chapters, because I just wasn't enjoying writing it. The idea was kinda half-baked, the plot didn't have as much planning as I'd like, and I ended up resorting to stream-of-consciousness writing a lot more than I would have liked. I've left this open to a direct sequel that I may or may not pick up on when the mood strikes me.


End file.
